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To Hell with Your War on Drugs
My father is visiting us here in Schenectady. While my he’s traveling, my mother is staying with my sister in Gettysburg. As some of you may know, my mother has some health problems, and as a result, is on serious pain medications.
Last night, my sister posted the following on Facebook:
Adventures in trying to get my mother’s pain medication (narcotic) refilled while she’s here visiting:
-Six calls to doctors offices-Six calls to the insurance company (two that resulted in having to ask for a supervisor)-Only one call to the insurance company that resulted in my hanging up on someone -Calls to six different pharmacies-Calls to six different urgent care facilities-Surprisingly, only one crying fit-Two calls to nurse navigator-Trips to two different urgent care facilities -Three calls to the pharmacy that finally has the prescription
And do we have it yet? No, because the insurance company screwed something up and refused to fix it in time for us to get it tonight.
Now, there’s no way that even a marginally free market could produce those results. The magic word included above is “narcotic.” My mother’s pain medication is a controlled substance. Controlled by whom? The government, of course.
Why? Well, every time I bring up the War on Drugs here on Ricochet, I’m basically told that we need to control drugs because of the destructive effects of addiction on individuals and families, or the costs to the public purse when people inevitably become addicted to a drug, lose their job, and go on welfare.
So let’s apply that idea here:
In order to protect my mother, a retired nurse, from the potential for addiction and to keep her from destroying her family, or to keep her doing losing her job and going on welfare, she has a hell of a time (and I think “hell” is a fair description here) getting pain medication.
Well, she’s retired, so she doesn’t have a job to lose, her illness does not lend itself to a long lifespan, and it’s the government controls, not the drugs, that’s causing her family stress.
Here’s the thing: While I have no doubt there are some people who pop pain pills recreationally (and let’s be real here, we’re talking about serious narcotics here, my mother has lung cancer), in order to keep those few people from popping pills, we make it so its hard for cancer patients to get pain medicine.
Does that make sense to you? Does it seem fair? Does it seem right?
Here’s the crux of the thing: The problem (one of many) with these kinds of restrictions is that they don’t just keep pills out of the hands of the people who use them recreationally, they also trip up people who have done nothing wrong, and who need them as medicine.
Now, I’ll hear from the nannies (and sorry, but that’s a fair term) who insist that they know what’s better for everyone else, that people popping drugs has negative consequences. Perhaps. But what about the negative consequences for my mother? Why is it difficult for her to get medicine? What did she do wrong to deserve this?
Published in Domestic Policy, General, Healthcare
Seems to me the long-term solution here is a better class of painkillers — painkillers that treat pain but are of no special interest to people who want to get high. In other words, it’s a medical research problem.
I wonder if those who know more about this than I do can shed any light on what the obstacles are to creating that kind of drug? Who’s doing the most interesting research on it? It seems to me the market for such drugs must be absolutely massive — people will pay a lot not to be in pain — so I can’t imagine the incentives aren’t there. An effective painkiller that posed no risk of mental impairment or addiction would be (I would think) one of the most profitable drugs ever manufactured.
Why is that problem so difficult, medically?
I’m so sorry. That’s a terrible story, and I’m sorry you and this little girl (is she your daughter?) went through such a thing.
Thank God the little girl was discovered in time.
I think only the extremely naive and sheltered would deny that many drugs that have the potential to alleviate extreme human suffering also have the ability to cause it.
I think we probably all agree that public policy should be designed with the goal of “alleviating suffering, not causing it.”
I wonder if a good starting point for all of us would be to acknowledge that certain medications (narcotics and anxiolytics, in particular) are unrivaled in their ability to alleviate suffering among those who most warrant our compassion — the gravely injured and the terminally ill. And they’re also the most apt to be abused, which can cause terrible suffering not only to the addict, but to innocents around him or her. I think everyone has heard a story like yours, or knows someone affected by such a story.
I wonder if we could agree that in trying to weigh one set of horrors against another, we should prioritize alleviating the suffering of the injured and dying over preventing the suffering of healthy people with agency.
As terrible and destructive as drug addiction is, in other words, it isn’t quite as horrible as the idea of dying of cancer without access to pain medication.
Do your moral intuitions basically align with that last sentence?
As someone who was recently taking lots of various prescriptions for tick-borne illness, I know how difficult it can be even to get doxycycline.
Narcotics must be a whole ‘nuther world, Fred, and I grind my teeth in anguish with you and your mom and whole family when I hear your story.
Regarding regulation, I feel that prescriptions should be optional.. Reputable pharmacists could set their own policy to require them or not, and patients could medicate themselves or not.
If the government had any role, it would be to insure accuracy in labeling, both in terms of what medicine the pill or whatever contains, and in correctly informing of side effects.
Crazy talk, I know.
One more thing, Fred.
I wish you would be more cautious about your rhetorical habit of laying out an impassioned argument and then dumping the blame and responsibility for defense on all the rest of us.
Who is this “you” whose War this is? If it is mine is it not yours as well?
Well obviously not you. The “you” is the prohibitionists and statists.
Doc – You raise many of the same points a physician friend of mine raises. Particularly about insurance & tort reform.
There is a big distance from not like the war on drugs and wanting full legalization. However, the title of this post does not sound like it acknowledges this at all, and furthermore, the post itself implies that unless we agree with you, we are somehow at fault for your mother’s horrible situation.
I understand your anger in response to your helplessness. As I am not for legalization, I also do not appreciate the headline. Telling someone to go to hell to end a discussion is not civil, nor is it a civil way to start one.
Claire, my moral intuitions have always lied in the very best care for the patient right in front of me. I ran a sort of hospice in a small town for a few years long ago and I never let anyone be short of drugs to ease treat pain( and sometimes enough to to be embraced in the lovingly fatal arms of Morpheus ).
Yes that girl was mine and she just started her freshman year of college. She is very happy.
He’d like to send the War on Drugs to Hell, not the people supporting it. I think his choice of words is fine. The innocent people who’ve been hurt by this “war” have had it up to here with others meddling in their affairs, and the trouble and pain caused by this meddling are severe. The anger implicit in the choice of words is real and is appropriate. There is such a thing as a rational anger based on deeply-thought reasons.
Forgive me — I’m confused. Do you mean that your moral intuitions have always been with the patient right in front of you, or that the plight of the patients in front of you have caused your moral intuitions to lie to you, i.e., to be in conflict with what you rationally believe to be good policy and more moral in the bigger picture? I think you mean the first, but want to double-check before replying.
I’ll be clearer. I’ve always made sure that suffering was treated, even when various family members looked a bit squirrelly. You asked, I think, what I considered more important, treating a suffering patient with heavy drugs or concern over those drugs being misused by others.
Got it. So, basically: We share intuitions on this.
And on that note, I’m off to do a house call on a post surgical patient with constipation complications from the Percocet who needs a dressing change. Really.
We have to be clear about the inherent dangers of cardiologists as well.
Fred, first of all..again my prayers go out to your family at this difficult time. As for the medication problem, I know of what of you speak.
My 85 year old Mom had surgery two years ago on a tumor so rare that it’s one for the text books. During the surgery, and in an effort to totally remove the tumor, the doctor scraped the tailbone. In doing so, he also dramatically triggered the nerves in the area and caused some damage. Since the day after the surgery, she’s been in a lot of pain and it has severely limited her movement. One of the many meds that have been tried is a pain patch. She uses it sparingly but with good results. No surprise to learn that her insurance now refuses to pay for it even though she hasn’t had more than one round of the prescription. Out-of-pocket for my fixed income parents is to much absorb since the cost is well over $500 for a couple of patches.
Amazingly, the insurance company would rather pay to continue to send her to different doctors and obtain more tests at far more expense than to provide a prescription that would give her comfort.
Is it the cost, the narcotic, or her age? Or is it all the above and then the additional issue of Obamacare all thrown together? Probably the latter. This is only going to get worse for all of us.
I think it would be helpful to draw a distinction between the politicians and bureaucrats who wage the war and the regular people who are reluctant to lift regulations of destructive substances.
There’s a connection, don’t you think? We can’t just blame politicians or bureaucrats for implementing policies that reflect what we fear and what we consequently vote for.
Thank God your daughter lived. I didn’t mean to (and rereading my comment, I don’t think I did) sugarcoat the horrors of addiction. Using heroin is a sure way to ruin lives: yours and those of anyone who cares about you. Why people decide to inject themselves with an extremely slow-acting poison is beyond me. Drinking alcohol or smoking are more understandable, though they wreak havoc as well, especially the former.
It’s unrelated to the OP, but your comment reminded me of this Pulitzer Prize-winning story in The Washington Post. Very few things make me cry, but the article had me in tears. Read it and be devastated.
There’s a connection, yes. However, politicians and bureaucrats stand to gain from these policies more than the general public. That and they’re more knowledgeable. Most people don’t think through every public policy. Considering the harm caused by drugs, and the extensive propaganda, it’s understandable that many people assume criminalization, or severe regulation, is the correct solution. Not that average citizens shouldn’t become informed, but I think those in power should be held to higher standards. Great leaders shift public opinion rather than bow to it.
So, unless I am for the full and immediate legalization of drugs, I am for or at fault for Fred’s mom’s situation?
If you’re in favor of policies, the result of which are to make it difficult for cancer patients to get pain meds, then I’d say you’re complicit.
Thus, despite what defenders of your headline say, you meant your headline and post as an emotional attack on members on Ricochet.
That, pretty much sums up my beef with your post, and the fact the Editors not only let it pass, but moved it to the main page.
I am sorry for your pain, and the pain of your mother and others. I am also sorry for the pain of millions of addicts and their families. If there were an easy answer, we would have executed it by now.
I think you’re looking for a reason to have a grievance with a post you disagree with.
If I want to say “to hell with you” I just would’ve said it. Obviously that’s not what I’m saying. If I wanted to tell other member to go to hell, I just would. (Except that I wouldn’t, because I don’t think it’d lead to a productive discussion).
It’s one thing to disagree with my position, it’s another to twist my words into something to complain about.
No, I am making a point about discourse. If I make a post saying “To Hell with your drug legalization”, with an impassioned story about how someone I loved life was destroyed, and how the pro-legalization people were “libertines”, do you think it will get promoted? Do you think no one will complain?
Fred, you have a history of making posts that are designed to rile people up. At least own it, and don’t act surprised when people react.
Fred, I am sorry. Her whole ordeal is absolutely rediulous. Your sister is a saint. Lung cancer is the worst. Your mother should have anything she needs. I do think it helps if you know your pharmacist, especially if it is an independent pharmacist.
If it was worthwhile, I don’t see why they wouldn’t promote it.
And I can’t speak for other people, but I wouldn’t complain about it getting promoted.
You should write it up as a post.
The difference is that drugs are illegal which didn’t stop the hypothetical person you loved from taking them.
Rather missing my real point about CoC. I give on this. Ricochet clearly has different rules for different posters.
We figured that out a couple of days ago, didn’t we?
So beating a dead horse, am I? Fair enough.