The NEW Media Pinata: Opioids

I am so sickened by the media's new idée fixe: Opioids. The think they have all the answers.

If it were up to them, people in the end stages of cancer wouldn't be given opioids because they might become addicted. People who are in excruciating pain and doomed to live with it could also be addicted. From their viewpoint it's so much more noble to suffer than live a life worth living.

I have twice been in the kind of pain that, if it had continued, I would have welcomed death. I understand pain. I'm blessed I don't have it to that degree, but I get it.

However, many of these anti-opioid crusaders are enjoying the latest hysteria without considering the cost to others.

And in the midst of all this obscene rabble-raising comes an interesting new angle: Look over here! This obscenely wealthy family is making a ...wait for it... PROFIT on opioids! Maybe we can gin up the masses on THIS new factoid.

And so Esquire now has an article out on the Sackler family out of Brooklyn. It's pretty interesting reading, actually. But the appeal is an obvious one. Since most of the media has socialistic leanings, they see the wealthy elite as boogeymen. They would, in fact, be very surprised to discover you may not. But just in case, they will attempt to manipulate you through envy, if you're not merely aghast at the concept of someone having more money than you.

The real issue is appallingly simple: Do we allow doctors to make decisions on our well-being and medications, or do we give that power to others? CVS has already make a power grab, here. They are now going to be overriding your doctor and allowing you only so many opioids per week in many cases. 

Insurance companies are meeting over the so-called 'opioid crisis' also, seeing this as a great excuse to deny payment in this category. And as we all know, insurance companies only have our very best interests at heart. 

Ahem.

They say Americans consume the majority of opiates, and that may be true. But there are 323 million people here, as opposed to only 65.6 million in the UK, and 67 million in France. So even if the percentage of the population using opiates remains the same, the US will outdistance most other countries. Anyone who's taken statistics knows to dig into figures like this.

This is manipulation.

This is unethical.

This is ginning up the masses, and it has consequences.

Many who are in pain and denied opiates are turning to heroin. I knew a Vietnam vet who had to take morphine daily. He's passed on now, but he had every reason to need it. He'd lost a leg in the war, and his severed, mutilated nerves were never at peace.

We need to stop non-medical interference with opiate prescriptions. 

The answer is to leave this up to the medical professionals. Not their hospital administrators. Not the insurance companies. And not the pharmacies.

Some day the tables will turn. Some day the American public will say they are tired of Big Brother.
Some day the pinata will get tired of being the punching bag.