Trump DOJ sues to block Overdose Prevention Centers - Polidicks

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-justice-department-goes-after-seattle-philadelphia-overdose-prevention-sites-as-crack-houses Two major U.S. cities are trying to open facilities to save drug users’ lives, but the Trump administration is trying to stop them, arguing the facilities are no different than crack houses. Seattle and Philadelphia plan to curb overdose deaths by opening facilities where drug users can ingest illicit substances like heroin under medical supervision. So-called overdose prevention sites are part of a strategy that seeks to reduce harm from drug use. The facilities were first popularized in Western Europe and have made their way to Canada and now potentially the U.S. While controversial and seemingly counterintuitive, over 100 such facilities currently operate in several countries, and public health experts consider them a staple of a robust strategy to prevent overdoses. Basically another instance of My Gut vs Your Science. Also the article mentions Pence did a similar program in Indiana, he did not, his state legislature forced his hand after the state was in the midst of a massive AIDs outbreak after cutting all AIDs related education and clinics

Legit fucking croak you cunt. You're actively trying to endanger the lives of actual Americans for your fucking ego. Legit go fucking die.

Rehab and prevention centers are factually cheaper on the tax dollar and more effective than prison time http://www.justicepolicy.org/uploads/justicepolicy/documents/04-01_rep_mdtreatmentorincarceration_ac-dp.pdf https://files.facepunch.com/forum/upload/716/cf307c24-da87-44a8-b0de-6edce99bfe6c/image.png But the "Small government low taxes" idiot doesn't care or understand this.

“ALL DRUGS ARE BAD! NO TAKING THEM, NONE! What’s that, you’re addicted? Just STOP! How is that hard?! Just STOP stabbing yourself, idiot! Go get a good job, marry a proper-sex spouse, and STOP! Just Say No, did you forget that in school?!?” (/S to the highest degree)

Also if people don’t go to prison as much then the prison industrial complex doesn’t get their piece of the pie.

Also also if you actually solved the problem you wouldn't be able to keep the war on drugs running, and think about the consequences of that!

"I literally believe the human body is a battery that can't be recharged and when it fully discharges that's when you die." - Trump, paraphrased He believes exercise is bad; that exercising kills you; that a 'good exercise' is standing on a stage for a few hours while giving a speech. He probably legitimately thinks all drugs are bad because he thinks anything that isn't his daily routine of a few walks and a few speeches is bad for you and people should stop doing them.

Shit like this makes me happy communities near me are starting to accept safe-injection sites instead of being NIMBY manchildren/soccer moms about it. Treating addicts like sick people instead of deliberate criminals is the way forward, unless you just don't care about poor people dying on the streets.

yeah as a guy with a caffeine problem that I'm trying to rein in I can tell you with absolute certainty that doing that will fuck up your thought process quite a bit, as it did both whenever I would go any time without swigging something caffeinated or whenever I'd pass another hundred milligrams like, while he's probably built up enough of a tolerance to avoid the jitters, getting that deep into caffeine will 100% screw with the rhythms of your body and leave you completely out of it for days at a time because your sleep is hyper-fucked

I keep getting little reminders at how amazing it is that Trump is alive.

One has to wonder if he'll actually make it through a second term if/when it happens. Between his Diet Coke, whether "Presidential Stress Aging Syndrome" is hitting him under his tan/wig, and how frustrated he makes some groups, It might be a possibility. Nothing we can count on no, but still...

rich people, best healthcare. For the entirety of human history being rich didn't really mean better medicine, just a better lifestyle, but today? there's whole fields of stuff the rich have access to that we don't.

Actually, it's an instance of I Want These People To Suffer And Die Because I Think They Deserve It ... vs science

I'm just going to say that as someone that's drank more than a pot of coffee each day for years, your body will adapt to the ~500mg daily intake with relative ease. The half-life for caffeine in vivo is variable and ranges from like an hour and a half to nine hours in sensitive individuals. Typically people that metabolize caffeine quicker tend to consume more, so people that consume a lot are rarely hitting serum concentration levels at their max daily intake. 500mg in an obese individual also doesn't go as far as someone at a healthy weight. If Trump drank all 12 diet cokes within an hour or something, that would be insane. The heart palpitations, fever, and sweat response would probably fuck him up pretty bad. His spray tanned face would melt. You would be able to see this on TV. The sheer volume of fluid is also a barrier. If we're talking about a regular 12oz can, we're looking at over 4 liters of diet coke a day. He's probably exaggerating his diet coke consumption. Even if he actually were to consume 12 cans of diet coke each day, Trump's erratic behavior and train of thought isn't likely a result of his caffeine consumption. The man has shit for brains and if he stopped consuming caffeine I don't think you'd see much of a difference.

All though prevention centers are in effective stopgap for the current problem of drug-related deaths, the main issue is the need to regulate/legalize narcotics. I know some people do not like hearing that, but it's easier to gauge the problem when you can see who is getting what, and then can ask them what is going on. Most people are self-medicating. Very few people out there are taking narcotics "just for fun" most are trying to either fix something or keep something bottled up. Getting those types of folks off narcotics isn't as simple as locking them in a room for a few days and expecting them to be better. It requires months of therapy and rebuilding a person to get them better.

Mostly yes, this is a systematic issue that needs to be tackled on all fronts to be nipped in the bud. Yes regulation/legalization is one aspect so less dangerous strains (with really nasty additives) are off the street. But prevention/rehab centers are also another piece of the puzzle required, along with clamping down on pharmacy companies that peddle opioids, cracking down on/removing mandatory minimums and neutering the DEA so its less fucking crazy.

Exactly. There are such better ways of handling the drug epidemic than people realize. I would absolutely love to see public facilities that offered legal opioids, clean needles, and help with addiction to those who needed it. That would help destroy the illegal heroin and fentanyl markets in ways the war on drugs never has. And of course, you know, fucking do something about big pharma pushing this shit down peoples throats and get them addicted before they even realize it. I really wish we could see more presidential candidates like Yang (Bernie please) come out in support of decriminalizing opioids.

Without any universal healthcare coverage, the government lacks any large scale program to provide addicts with the long term healthcare services they require to stay clean, plus our healthcare system sucks with dealing with addicts in general. I have a family member who's been hospitalized twice from his prescription medication and the doctor his insurance sends him to keeps prescribing it to him anyways. Its practically criminal but I can't do anything about it and he's certainly not going to quit of his own accord, he's already addicted to several other things.

It's not that they don't understand, it's that private prisons are a growing industry and a source of cheap slave labor, and harsh drug policies and ineffective prison systems are a well known tool used for minority suppression by a party with a long history of racism and prejudice High rates of recidivism and ineffective prison systems are just fine and dandy with the GOP. I'd even go as far as to say it's the whole fucking point. It's less black people for them to worry about, it's cheap labor to help slash overheads for their corporate butt buddies, and it's perfect for their posturing about being Tough On Crime!™ and pleasing for the Race Realist™ and white supremacist crowd they're so happy to flirt with The GOP isn't full of idiots. They know good and god damn well what they're doing. It's full of criminals and racists who are out to make a quick buck and stick it to the darkies

A near-majority of illegal drug overdose deaths now involve fentanyl. Street users don’t try to buy fentanyl (i’ve asked around plenty when I volunteer with the homeless in my area, a number of whom are addicts), it’s just used to cut the product and make it stronger while using less actual heroin/whatever opioid. We are literally letting tens of thousands of people die a year because we are too stubborn to make a safe supply of heroin and other illicit drugs available to adult users. Supervised injection sites are a step in the right direction, but if I had the choice to federally legalize either marijuana or heroin, I would legalize heroin. With this shit, lives are at stake. The War On Drugs creating an unregulated black market is WHY so many people die from drugs.

It's also worth noting that a significant number of opiate addicts got started on legal and prescribed opioids, and that pharmaceutical companies actively mislead health professionals about the risks of the product they're pushing and push for higher rates of prescription

It's also worth noting that the pushback against this practice (cracking down on opioid prescriptions, making every doctor who deals with pain patients fearful as fuck of the DEA, adding arbitrary restrictions and requirements to the dosages and amount of controlled substances that can be prescribed) has ultimately led to a significant number of legitimate chronic pain patients being deprived of pain medication that they actually need (or they suffer horribly). This has pushed an unknowable number of formerly doctor-supervised opioid using pain patients to using street opioids like heroin (and risking death from the unknown strength and possible fentanyl adulteration present in street opioids), as people's doctors have suddenly cut them off, switched their meds to the weaker "approved" ones, or reduced their dosage intolerably due to pressure from drug enforcement/law enforcement agencies. The result is that they stop seeing their doctor, and start using even stronger and potentially deadly street opioids with no supervision, which has undoubtedly resulted in a significant number of deaths. There's a lot of blood on the hands of those who think that they're "cracking down on shady doctors." I'd rather have people taking regulated, unadulterated prescription pills like oxycodone, tramadol, etc. instead of using dirty street heroin. The people who support a crackdown on pharmaceutical opioids would evidently rather have pain patients and addicts alike using heroin that could have fentanyl in it. I guess being an opioid user (whether for pain or otherwise) means you deserve to have to risk death just to stop your suffering, right? The mentality of "well they chose to do the drugs, and that's what happens" is callous, cruel and completely devoid of empathy, and if anyone reading this thinks like that, please just take a hard look in the mirror. The person who's reflection you're seeing is just as liable as anyone else to get addicted to opioids. If you did oxycodone, you would feel great. It's only the conditions and circumstances you happen to be lucky enough to live in that separates you from the people who have so little hope that popping pills, snorting powder, smoking blacktar off tinfoil, or sticking themselves with a needle are the only way for them to even feel okay, let alone good. (Disclaimer: I'm not presuming that you hold any of these beliefs Sitkero, but I just wanted to write this for anyone who thinks that "cracking down on dirty doctors" will actually fix our completely preventable accidental overdose crisis.)

Actually, the situation is a lot more complicated than just a "prison industrial complex." See what cis.joshb said about "evil corporations and corruption"-- Nope, it's structural issues, not malevolence. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/magazine/prison-abolition-ruth-wilson-gilmore.html?