In today's Wall Street Journal, front page above fold Pain-Pill Crackdown Spreads is the latest in the war on drugs. THE GUARDIAN is suspect of all this fuss by government snooping into Walgreen's, CVS and Cardinal Health. People in chronic pain don't take pain killers to get high, they take them to try and feel normal. Chronic pain is endemic yet the government is zeroing in on pharmacies and doctors who prescribe these drugs to patients.
THE GUARDIAN is suspect of the statistics cited in the article of 1.5 million people addicted and 15,000 deaths each year from pain killers. What is not known are the underlying circumstances of the need to use these drugs in the first place. Chronic pain due to back injuries, arthritis, stenosis of vertebrae in the back, deteriorated joints due to old age and any number of things will lead people to use these medications just to get some relief down to a manageable level. And now the Federal Government is looking to expand the war on drugs to this?
Doctors who work with terminally ill patients walk a fine line with government snooping in trying to help people manage their chronic pain and put a modicum of quality back into their daily lives. How many people in the above statistics were terminally ill or who had put up with years and years of chronic pain and simply decided to put a stop to their suffering?
At some point in the last few years of life we start unraveling like a cheap sweater and all manner of pain and health issues beset the elderly. I see this latest war on prescription pain killers no help the the elderly and those who are terminally ill.
These patients should be allowed to take whatever is deemed necessary to put some quality back into their lives.
Florida was the place the article emphasized. Well, let me think, the place is full of old people seeking relief from all the pains of old age. DEA has now copped an attitude on old people, isn't this just swell.
ReplyDeleteWhen one says Florida, you think of Jeb Bush and the Bush way of thinking. They have now come up with a solution that creates a problem. Typical Bush style politics.
DeleteThere is no Pain Pill that will kill the pain in the arse caused by the government. Just remember they are here to help us. Excuse me, I am about to choke up because we're so cared about and don't see an end to this.
ReplyDeleteGoing after people who use pain killers and the doctors who prescribe them is just plain goofy. I have been taking pain killers for the last 15 years. Without them I can't function due to all the pain from two back surgeries, broken legs and severe arthritis. I got along well with propoxyphene for years but they took it off the market. Morphine is too strong and Tylenol 3 too weak.. I say let the patient manage his or her pain with the willing help of their doctors. Government snooping in this is a witch hunt.
ReplyDeleteI think that this is more of a state government type issue. There are quite a few of those conservative radical right-wing hate mongering states out there that would declare a war on middle-class senior citizens, and take their medications away. To bad that Idaho is beginning to follow that path. Looks to me like Florida is already there.
DeleteI have to agree with this one. I am a health care provider and I see professional drug seekers wasting rescources, wasting time, and wasting tax payers dollars (because most of these so called disabled are medicaid...driving nice cars with nice clothes, but on medicaid) EVERY DAY I work.
ReplyDeleteAnd I see the same doctors names pop up again and again on the scripts.
Prescription drug ABUSE is easy to see if you are willing to do the leg work. This is BILLIONS of dollars illicit drug trade. Oxycontin, vicodin, Norco, Adderal, flexeril are just some of the most commonly abused drugs. Seriously, we see more of this than we see methamphetamine abuse.
Its a whole different world I imagine most of the readers here have no idea about. ....