[Vision2020] Narcotics = Good, Marijuana = Evil?

Fri Apr 6 19:19:45 PDT 2012

Legalizing marijuana for all uses, medicinal and recreational, for anyone over the age of 21 who cares to use it -- with proper taxation, distribution, and penalties for misuse --  seems to be one of the most obviously, clearly, evidently correct things to do that I have a hard time taking the anti-marijuana-legalization position seriously.  I know that position generally stems from a belief that "drugs are bad, marijuana is a drug, ergo marijuana is bad," but that sort of thinking rarely results in good law.

Marijuana is an organic substance given us by a loving Creator, one that would be of enormous help to those of us who suffer from chronic pain and other conditions.  I consider it a gift, one whose receipt and usage I object to being prevented by people who have no business interfering.  I don't generally take my political cues from reggae artists, but, to quote the late Peter Tosh, "LEGALIZE IT!!!!!"

Keely
www.keely-prevailingwinds.com

Date: Fri, 6 Apr 2012 08:26:21 -0700
From: art.deco.studios at gmail.com
To: vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: [Vision2020] Narcotics = Good, Marijuana = Evil?

Painkiller sales spike, fueling addiction

Overdose death toll from opioids rising

        Chris Hawley

    Associated Press

 NEW YORK – Sales of the nation’s two most popular prescription 
painkillers have exploded in new parts of the country, an Associated 
Press analysis shows, worrying experts who say the push to relieve 
patients’ suffering is spawning an addiction epidemic. 
 From New York’s Staten Island to Santa Fe, N.M., Drug Enforcement 
Administration figures show dramatic rises between 2000 and 2010 in the 
distribution of oxycodone, the key ingredient in OxyContin, Percocet and
 Percodan. Some places saw sales increase sixteenfold. 
 Meanwhile, the distribution of hydrocodone, the key ingredient in 
Vicodin, Norco and Lortab, is rising in Appalachia, the original 
epicenter of the painkiller epidemic, as well as in the Midwest. 
 The increases have coincided with a wave of overdose deaths, 
pharmacy robberies and other problems in New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, 
Florida and other states. Opioid pain relievers, the category that 
includes oxycodone and hydrocodone, caused 14,800 overdose deaths in 
2008 alone, and the death toll is rising, the Centers for Disease 
Control and Prevention says. 
 Nationwide, pharmacies received and ultimately dispensed the 
equivalent of 69 tons of pure oxycodone and 42 tons of pure hydrocodone 
in 2010, the last year for which statistics are available. That’s enough
 to give 40 5-mg Percocets and 24 5-mg Vicodins to every person in the 
United States. The DEA data records shipments from distributors to 
pharmacies, hospitals, practitioners and teaching institutions. The 
drugs are eventually dispensed and sold to patients, but the DEA does 
not keep track of how much individual patients receive. 
 The increase is partly due to the aging U.S. population with pain 
issues and a greater willingness by doctors to treat pain, said Gregory 
Bunt, medical director at New York’s Daytop Village chain of drug 
treatment clinics. 
 Sales are also being driven by addiction, as users become physically
 dependent on painkillers and begin “doctor shopping” to keep the 
prescriptions coming, he said. 
 Opioids like hydrocodone and oxycodone can release intense feelings 
of well-being. Some abusers swallow the pills; others crush them, then 
smoke, snort or inject the powder. 
 The AP analysis used drug data collected quarterly by the DEA’s 
Automation of Reports and Consolidated Orders System. The DEA tracks 
shipments sent from distributors to pharmacies, hospitals, practitioners
 and teaching institutions and then compiles the data using three-digit 
ZIP codes. 
 The AP combined this data with census figures to determine effective sales per capita. 
 A few ZIP codes that include military bases or Veterans Affairs 
hospitals have seen large increases in painkiller use because of soldier
 patients injured in the Middle East, law enforcement officials say. In 
addition, small areas around St. Louis, Indianapolis, Las Vegas and 
Newark, N.J., have seen their totals affected because mail-order 
pharmacies have shipping centers there, said Carmen Catizone, executive 
director of the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy. 
 In 2000, oxycodone sales were centered in coal-mining areas of West 
Virginia and eastern Kentucky – places with high concentrations of 
people with back problems and other chronic pain. 
 But by 2010, the strongest oxycodone sales had overtaken most of 
Tennessee and Kentucky, stretching as far north as Columbus, Ohio and as
 far south as Macon, Ga. 
 Per-capita oxycodone sales increased five- or six-fold in most of Tennessee during the decade. 
 “We’ve got a problem. We’ve got to get a handle on it,” said Tommy 
Farmer, a counterdrug official with the Tennessee Bureau 
of Investigation. 
 Many buyers began crossing into Tennessee to fill prescriptions 
after border states began strengthening computer systems meant to 
monitor drug sales, Farmer said. 
 In 2006, only 20 states had prescription drug monitoring programs 
aimed at tracking patients. Now 40 do, but many aren’t linked together, 
so abusers can simply go to another state when they’re flagged in one 
state’s system. There is no federal monitoring of prescription drugs at 
the patient level. 
 In Florida, the AP analysis underscores the difficulty of the 
state’s decade-long battle against “pill mills,” unscrupulous doctors 
who churn out dozens of prescriptions a day. 
 In 2000, Florida’s oxycodone sales were centered around West Palm 
Beach. By 2010, oxycodone was flowing to nearly every part of the state.

 While still not as high as in Appalachia or Florida, oxycodone sales
 also increased dramatically in New York City and its suburbs. The 
borough of Staten Island saw sales leap 1,200 percent. 
 The American Southwest has emerged as another hot spot. 
 Parts of New Mexico have seen tenfold increases in oxycodone sales 
per capita and fivefold increases in hydrocodone. The state had the 
highest rate of opioid painkiller overdoses in 2008, with 27 per 
100,000 population. 
 Many parts of eastern California received only modest amounts of 
oxycodone in 2010, but the increase from 2000 was dramatic – more than 
500 percent around Modesto and Stockton. 
 Many California addicts are switching from methamphetamine to 
prescription pills, said John Harsany, medical director of Riverside 
County’s substance abuse program. 

-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com

=======================================================
 List services made available by First Step Internet,
 serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
               http://www.fsr.net
          mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
======================================================= 		 	   		  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/attachments/20120406/546fd2be/attachment.html>