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Category: Addiction News

  • Big Pharma Tries To Slip Benefit Into Senate Opioid Package

    Big Pharma Tries To Slip Benefit Into Senate Opioid Package

    “Big Pharma is trying to hijack the bill and turn it into a giant pharmaceutical company bailout,” said Senator Tina Smith (D-Minnesota).

    Pharmaceutical companies are attempting to inject $4 billion in savings for themselves into opioid legislation being considered in Congress. 

    A package of bills meant to address the opioid epidemic have passed both the House and Senate, and the two bodies are now working together to craft a version that both can agree on.

    The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, or PhRMA, has tried to get a clause added to the bill that would reduce the discount that pharmaceutical companies need to offer Medicare beneficiaries whose spending on drugs falls into the coverage gap, according to The New York Times.  

    “We have a good bipartisan opioids bill and we need to get it signed into law. But now Big Pharma is trying to hijack the bill and turn it into a giant pharmaceutical company bailout,” Senator Tina Smith (D-Minnesota) said in a Twitter post.

    Right now, pharmaceutical companies are required to discount brand-name drugs 50% for people in the coverage gap. Next year, the discount is set to increase to 70%. The increased discount was initially designed to reduce federal spending on Medicare’s drug benefit by $7.7 billion through 2027.

    However, after the law was passed increasing the discount, the Congressional Budget Office raised its estimate of the savings to $11.8 billion. Because of this, PhRMA would like the discount reduced to cover only the $7.7 billion savings, calling the updated level a “technical error.” 

    The AARP said that PhRMA’s proposal “will increase prescription drug costs for older Americans while providing a windfall of billions of dollars to the drug industry.”

    The prescription drug discount has nothing to do with the opioid crisis—but because there is broad bipartisan support for passing the opioid legislation quickly, PhRMA is trying to slip its desired changes into the bill while it has momentum, the Times noted. 

    “We are focused on ensuring Medicare Part D is secure for the future by correcting a technical error” by the Congressional Budget Office, said Stephen J. Ubl, the president and chief executive of PhRMA.

    However, most people outside PhRMA disagree. 

    “In the context of the current debate, I would not roll back the drug discounts,” said Mark E. Miller, the former executive director of a federal commission that advises Congress on Medicare. “We need broader changes in the structure of Medicare’s drug benefit. If the discounts are rolled back, patients and taxpayers should get something in return, to bring more competition to the market and drive down drug prices.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Overdose Deaths Increase in New Jersey Even As Prescriptions Decline

    Overdose Deaths Increase in New Jersey Even As Prescriptions Decline

    State attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal says that despite the fatal OD increase “there are reasons for hope.”

    Opioid overdose deaths in New Jersey increased by 24% last year, even as the number of prescriptions written for opioids fell for the first time in recent years. 

    According to a press release from the state attorney general’s office, just over half of opioid overdose deaths in the state were caused by fentanyl and other synthetic opioids meant to mimic its strength. 

    “We still lose too many of our residents to drug overdoses, and the death toll continues to rise,” said Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal. “But, if we look at the numbers, there are reasons for hope.”

    Despite the fact that an average of eight New Jersey residents die from an opioid overdose each day, Grewal said that policies to limit prescriptions of opioids are working. The state’s opioid prescription rate peaked in 2015, when 5.64 million opioid prescriptions were dispensed.

    By 2017, that number was down to 4.87 million, making last year the first “in recent memory when the number of opioid prescriptions fell below 5 million,” said the press release. 

    In March 2017, the state enacted a five-day limit on first-time opioid prescriptions. Since then, prescriptions of opioids have decreased 26%.

    Between January 2014 and March 2017 they were reduced just 18%, so this suggests a significant improvement in cutting back on opioid prescriptions. Overall, opioid prescriptions have been reduced by 39% between January 2014 and July of this year.

    “The decreasing rate of prescription opioids dispensed in New Jersey shows that a smart approach to the opioid epidemic can help turn the tide. If we persist in our efforts to prevent addiction and overdoses, we can save lives,” said Sharon Joyce, director of the Office of the New Jersey Coordinator for Addiction Responses and Enforcement Strategies (NJ CARES).

    In order to try and decrease the opioid overdose rate, the state will begin offering more information online, including data on naloxone administration rates and overdose rates for specific counties. 

    “The Attorney General is not only making his Department’s opioids data publicly available,” the press release said. “Through NJ CARES, the Department is relying on data to target its education efforts and identify its enforcement priorities.”

    The administration is also focusing on outreach efforts, including an ad campaign to highlight a safe disposal program for unused prescriptions.

    And the musical Anytown will be performing at middle and high schools across the state to raise awareness about the dangers of opioids. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Scientists Used Gambling Monkeys To Try To Figure Out Addiction

    Scientists Used Gambling Monkeys To Try To Figure Out Addiction

    The experiment’s goal was to understand which regions of the brain wield influence over decision-making.

    The behavior of a pair of monkeys with a taste for juice—and gambling—may suggest that risky decisions, from high stakes betting to criminal behavior, is less of a personality trait and more an issue of brain circuitry.

    Scientists conducted an experiment in which the monkeys were taught to play a computer game that rewarded them with juice, the amount of which varied depending on the risk level of their decision.

    When the scientists found that a region of the brain involved with eye movements became activated when the monkeys took greater risks, they temporarily deactivated the region—and found that the test subjects made far less rash decisions.

    The research suggests that risk preference is not fixed but adaptable, and by understanding the brain function involved in those decisions, help could be provided for individuals who have “decision-making disorders” like substance or gambling dependency.

    The research, conducted by scientists from Johns Hopkins University and published in the September 2018 edition of Current Biology, sought to determine whether risk-taking was a personality trait—in short, “that some people are risk takers and others are not,” said study co-author and Johns Hopkins associate professor Veit Stuphorn. 

    The scientists devised a computer game in which the test subjects—two rhesus macaques—were offered two choices: one, which provided a guaranteed but small amount of juice, and the other, which might bring a more substantial amount of juice, or none at all. To indicate their choice, the monkey would move their eyes in each round.

    What the scientists found was that the monkeys consistently chose the bigger but less safe option, even in the face of getting consistent but smaller amounts of juice instead of none at all.

    They also discovered that the supplementary eye field (SEF)—a region in the frontal lobe of primates’ cerebral cortex that is involved in eye movement, and possibly in the eye’s role in decision-making—became very active when the monkeys earned a larger reward.

    But as NPR noted, the activity didn’t prove that it correlated with the monkeys’ behavior, so the scientists temporarily deactivated that area of the brain through cooling. Once inactive, the monkeys made safer bets by choosing the smaller but consistent option for juice.

    The study findings do not conclusively determine that the SEF is responsible for high-risk decision-making; rather, it suggests that making risky decisions is not a set and permanent aspect of an individual’s personality.

    The brain might alter those choices based on a number of factors, including the level of reward. It’s also possible that other regions of the brain may be complicit in making high-risk choices. 

    Understanding which regions of the brain wield influence over decision-making could have far-ranging implications in the treatment of conditions that involve rash choices.

    “One would be to help people who have decision-making disorders, whether that’s problem gambling or addiction, or other things like that,” said Michael Platt, the James S. Riepe University Professor of neuroscience, marketing and psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. “We might be able to develop more effective therapies.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Views From A Rehab Counselor

    Views From A Rehab Counselor

    No amount of comfort is enough when there is a look of terror on someone admitting to treatment for the first time.

    “I want to be that little girl!”  

    A woman in her late 40s is sitting in front of me in my office, sobbing as she stares at a black and white picture of my then four-year-old daughter being twirled on the dancefloor, her white crinoline dress slightly blurred by the movement of her swirl. She has a smile of joy that only a four-year-old can have.  

    The woman is a patient I’m admitting to the rehab facility where I’m a counselor. She is highly intoxicated and emotionally distraught. This is her first time in treatment.

    I immediately regret having the picture so visible, something I know a lot of counselors and therapists would never do and as I move to put the picture facedown on the window sill, she begs me not to. For some reason she is fixated on my daughter’s image.

    In the three years that I’ve been in the field there is something new happening—more and more older men and women—those in their 40s through late 60s—are entering treatment for the first time for their alcohol dependence.  

    It’s also happening with people in their 20s—young, suburban, college-educated, fresh-faced young people attempting to stop drinking.

    Prior to this job, I worked in an all-male halfway house for 30 men. In the year that I was there, maybe four of the 50 or so guys I had on my rotating caseload struggled with alcoholism. The rest were mostly 20 and 30-year-olds who were addicted to heroin.

    This carried over into my current job where initially most of the patients coming in were younger, a little rough around the edges, wanting to detox from opiates and benzos. Then suddenly, just a few months ago, something seems to have shifted.  

    I’m stunned by the amount of alcohol these patients have been drinking on a daily basis. I went into my local liquor store to ask the owner to show me what a “handle” is and what a “sleeve” of nips looks like.  

    For me, someone who is not in recovery and looks forward to a glass of wine at the end of the day, who stops the second I feel a little buzzed I can’t wrap my head around that desire, that need to completely obliterate oneself to the point of blackout. I can count on less than two hands the number of times I’ve been even slightly drunk and only one time when I actually got a touch of the bed spins. I’ve never thrown up from drinking, never passed out. 

    I know enough to realize that a good number of people with substance use disorders are self-medicating for one thing or another, for the pain and anguish, the unaddressed trauma and mental health issues that lurk beneath the surface.  

    If a family member accompanies the patient to our facility they will often take me aside and fill me in on some details that the patient wouldn’t necessarily reveal themselves during the intake process. It comes out eventually during the customary 28-day stay, with the gentle guidance of insightful therapists and peers.  

    Obviously the hard part, the seemingly impossible task, will be for them to find other ways to cope once treatment is complete.

    I have a special fondness for the men and women who arrive to the facility under the influence. I love the rollercoaster ride they take me on with them, the ups and downs, the loop-the-loops, the crying and yelling.  

    I’m okay with being told to “fuck off” and then only two minutes later being told that I’m their guardian angel. I was recently told that I was “hotter than a hand grenade” by a man whose blood alcohol level was off the charts.  

    I told him that when he sobered up how disappointed he’d be in my “hotness” level. And yes, when I DID see him the next day, he barely remembered me.   

    No amount of comfort is enough when there is a look of terror on someone admitting to treatment for the first time. I can only do so much by telling them that it’s going to be okay, that they’ve come to the right place, that they’re so brave for making this first step. I get to go home at the end of the day. I don’t have to be woken up every four hours to have my vital signs taken or worry about who my roommate might be.  

    Some time during my intake the woman sitting in front of me looked at the picture of my daughter, put her head down, still sobbing and defeated and filled with shame and said, “I’m NEVER going to be that little girl.”

    It was clear that she didn’t think she would ever achieve a moment of such complete joy and freedom, that she would ever be spun around on a dance floor in a twirly dress. It took a couple of hours to complete her paperwork and by the time we wrapped up, she had sobered up quite a bit.  

    As I stood up to escort her to the unit, she looked at the picture one more time, some strong and silent resolution having been made, the belief that joy could and would be achieved in her life and said, “I’m GOING to be that little girl.”

    I so hope that she has found many joyful and free moments since she left treatment, that she dances in her living room with a smile on her face.  

    Gayle Saks has written extensively about her work as a substance abuse counselor from the unique perspective of someone who is not in recovery herself. Her blog, My Life In The Middle Ages, was voted one of the Top 20 Recovery Blogs for 2016 by AfterParty Magazine. She has written on the subject for The Fix, HuffPost, mindbodygreen and Thought Catalog. She has also written about being the daughter of a Holocaust survivor and the eventual suicide of her mother. Her pieces on the subject have appeared in kveller where she is a regular contributor, The Jewish Journal, and MammaMia.

    In 2013 she was invited to be on a panel on HuffPost Live to talk about being middle-aged, where her 15 minutes of poignant and intelligent conversation turned into a soundbyte about her having a hot flash at a Justin Timberlake/Jay-Z concert. 

    Saks grew up on Long Island, New York, and lives in the Greater Boston area with her husband, daughter, two cats and two dogs or as her husband says, “Too many beating hearts.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Treatment Clinic Beat The Odds To Help Patients During Hurricane Florence

    Treatment Clinic Beat The Odds To Help Patients During Hurricane Florence

    “Some of those nurses were without power, they sustained damage to their homes, but they showed up every day.”

    When Hurricane Florence swept through the middle of the country, it left behind patients in treatment without access to their possibly life-saving medications.

    The hurricane brought with it flooding and blocked roads and bridges—putting patients in addiction treatment who use methadone or buprenorphine at risk of withdrawal or worse, relapse.

    One opioid addiction clinic, the Carolina Treatment Center, worked beyond its means to provide care for the stranded and desperate coming in from far and wide.

    The clinic would have been in dire straits if the nurses working there—most of them severely and personally affected by the hurricane—had not been able to show up.

    The clinic’s head nurse Kristen Morales worked 16 days in a row while living at a nearby hotel to ensure she could show up for her job. Huffington Post interviewed the treatment center director, Louis Leake, as he worked cases from as far off as Louisiana.

    “We can do a lot of things, but we can’t do a lot of things without nurses,” Leake said. “Some of those nurses were without power, they sustained damage to their homes, but they showed up every day.”

    Past studies have shown the toll that intense storms take on the community of addiction recovery. One study published in Substance Use Misuse, on Hurricane Sandy, concluded that among other troubling findings (such as the increase of shared use of needles) 70% of those in opioid maintenance therapy could not obtain sufficient doses to remain off of opioids.

    The town of Fayetteville’s clinic was closed for a mandatory three-day evacuation. Patients were given between three and six days of treatment medication to take home, after which they had to be resupplied.

    The Carolina Treatment Center was outside of the evacuation zone and took in all of Fayetteville’s addiction treatment patients, to treat a total of more than 900 patients.

    Despite the four days of medication that patients could take home, between the three-day evacuation and road closures and flooding, many patients would have had to suffer through withdrawal or relapse if the Carolina Treatment Center had not gone above and beyond to provide a safety net for this vulnerable community.

    Patient Teri Cooper told The Huffington Post, “It was busy, but thank God I could come here. I guess I would have got some damn drugs, to be honest. [if the clinic were closed] If I didn’t feel good. That’s the truth.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • SNL’s Pete Davidson Realized “It Wasn’t The Weed” In Rehab

    SNL’s Pete Davidson Realized “It Wasn’t The Weed” In Rehab

    “I was sober for 3 months at one point and I was like this f— sucks.”

    In a recent interview, Saturday Night Live’s Pete Davidson expanded on his decision to return to smoking weed after a brief period of sobriety made him realize he was “never sadder.”

    The 24-year-old Staten Island native told Howard Stern on Monday (Sept. 24) that he needed rehab to gain control of his marijuana use, but ultimately, could not live without it.

    “There was no way I could stop. I was like somebody has to put me in a house where there is literally nothing. I had too much access,” Davidson said. The comedian entered a treatment program in December 2016.

    He said in 2017: “I never really did any other drugs, so I was like, ‘I’m gonna try to go to rehab. Maybe that’ll be helpful.’”

    But once he was in treatment, he said “it wasn’t the weed.”

    “I was sober for 3 months at one point and I was like this f— sucks,” he told Stern. Davidson said in a past interview with Pete Rosenberg that he was “never sadder and everything was just way worse” during this period of abstinence.

    But at first, he seemed to enjoy the immediate effects of quitting marijuana. In a since-deleted Instagram post from March 2017, he said, “I quit drugs and am happy and sober for the first time in 8 years. It wasn’t easy but I got a great girl, great friends and I consider myself a lucky man.”

    But later he would be diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD), an explanation for why he feels “depressed all the time.” “This whole year has been a f— nightmare,” he said in September of last year. “This has been the worst year of my life, getting diagnosed with [BPD] and trying to figure out how to learn with this and live with this.”

    Davidson has been candid about his marijuana use and how it helps him cope with BPD as well as Crohn’s disease.

    “I have Crohn’s disease, so it helps more than you can imagine,” he told Stern. “There was a point where I couldn’t get out of bed. I was 110 pounds.”

    He told High Times in a past interview: “I found that the medicines that the doctors were prescribing me, and seeing all these doctors and trying new things, weed would be the only thing that would help me eat.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • God Hates Pikachu and He Also Killed My Daddy

    God Hates Pikachu and He Also Killed My Daddy

    My higher power doesn’t want me sticking a needle in my arm. For me today, it’s as simple as that.

    I didn’t want to unpack this story so soon. My aim was to share my experience with getting and staying sober in a dry and witty way, do that for a while with you, maybe unpack the heavy stuff after we got to know each other a little more, and then go for the gusto. I didn’t want to bring up a subject that might rub you the wrong way but I recently finished a writing exercise that really got me thinking about my dad. He’s dead.

    My father died when I was two years old. He was a heroin user who shared needles. Nobody was talking about harm reduction in the late 80’s nor were they concerned about the consequences of IV drug use. After he got sober, he found out that he had contracted HIV. It wasn’t long after that diagnosis that he lost his battle to AIDS.

    I believe growing up without a father had an effect on the man I am today; but this isn’t a story about my dad. This isn’t a story about harm reduction or AIDS awareness. This is a story about God.

    Wait! Stay with me, please. Don’t go.

    I promise you this isn’t that kind of story. I’ve done right by you with the last two articles. I plan on doing the same with this one. I know the God word bothers some people. It bothers me sometimes. It’s okay, just keep scrolling. We’ll do this one together. Besides, you have to at least get to the part about Pikachu. I’m sure you’re wondering what the heck he’s got to do with all this. Stick around, I’ll tell you.

    I grew up in an extremely charismatic religious household; the crazy dogmatic type. Let me tell you how crazy: Did you know that if you listen to any music that isn’t religious, demons will literally fly out of your headphones like a vapor of smoke and possess you? It’s true. My aunt told me that when I was only eight years old. Also, if you watch any movie that isn’t rated G or about the crucifixion of Christ, you run the chance of committing your soul into the fiery pits of hell. Here’s a good one: My younger brother and I were not allowed to watch Pokemon because our grandmother told us that those cute little Japanese cartoons were actually demons and it was Satan’s master plan to trick unassuming kids into falling in love with his minions.

    Here’s a few more examples:

    1. Don’t drink beer. You’re ingesting the semen of the devil.
    2. True love waits. So if you have sex before marriage, you’re going to burn in hell.
    3. Never smoke cigarettes, you’ll accidentally inhale a demon.
    4. Don’t use profanity unless you want God to give your tongue cancer.
    5. Hey boys, do you like your hands? Well, don’t play with your penis, that’s how you lose them.

    Here’s my absolute favorite. When I was kid, my mom brought my younger brother and me to this old-time-holy-ghost Pentecostal church in the hood. The younger children had to go to Sunday school with some 16-year-old babysitter while the adults went to “big church” in the main auditorium. While we were waiting for our mom to pick us up, our babysitter kindly told me that God killed my dad because he was a junkie.

    Yup, that’s right. This ignorant girl basically told me that God “gave” my dad AIDS because he was in love with heroin. And it was God’s perfect judgment to execute my powerless addict of a father. Cool, right? I’m going to grow up to be a perfectly normal man, unscathed by any of this tomfoolery.

    When you grow up in an overbearing legalistic household and finally start doing some of the things that they told you not to and nothing bad happens, you end up slamming your foot on the gas, speeding straight into the freedom to do everything you’re not supposed to. The things you didn’t do growing up because you believed they would kill you turn into myths created to control you.

    This isn’t going to end well for an addict like me. Once I started thinking for myself and realized that my dick wouldn’t fall off if I watch porn, I started watching all the porn. When I realized that I wasn’t possessed after smoking a cigarette, I started smoking all the cigarettes. Add sex to the mix, sprinkle a little drugs on top, and my newfound freedom as a junkie sinner is complete.

    Let’s fast-forward a few years because I don’t want to get into other stories that deserve their own headline. Let’s land where I’m walking down the steps of the courthouse with a piece of paper that mandates that I start attending 12-step meetings. Meetings that I must go to or I’m going back to jail and possibly prison.

    Imagine my delight, sitting in my first meeting while they’re doing the readings. I hear the 3rd step read aloud for the first time and everything within my gut cringes. I die on the inside. I’m powerless over drugs and alcohol. I can’t stop. I need to stop. And now I’m being told that the only way to do this is with God. I’m in big trouble. 

    I have a confession to make. Remember when I told you that this story was about God? It isn’t. I mean it is and it can be for you, too, but it really isn’t. It’s about a higher power; something greater than you. It’s crucial that you hear what I’m about to say.

    If you’re a 12-stepper who’s all gung-ho about the 3rd step, that’s cool. If you’re not a 12-stepper who’s grasped the God concept, that’s cool too.

    What I want to be explicitly clear about is just one thing. It’s my experience, being an addict in recovery— whether it’s the 12-step route or not—that at some point I have to accept the fact that I need saving. And it’s not going to be me that’s going to do the saving. It’s got to be something greater than me. What I’m good at is getting high. Getting sober is easy. Staying sober isn’t. That’s where the saving comes in for me.

    In the beginning. G-O-D meant a lot of things.

    • Group of Druggies
    • Group of Drunks
    • Grow or Die
    • Guaranteed Overnight Delivery (kidding)
    • Good Orderly Direction

    A wise man once told me, “I don’t know what God’s will is for my life… but I know what it isn’t.” I know that my higher power doesn’t want me stealing in sobriety. I know I shouldn’t be smoking crack. I know that now that I’m attempting to live a new way, maybe I should concern myself with my physical health since I neglected it for so long. My higher power doesn’t want me sticking a needle in my arm. For me today, it’s as simple as that.

    For people who don’t subscribe to an acronym but actually believe in a God, it can be slippery if it’s not kept simple. It’s common for people to get sober and say, “Okay, what do I do know? What is my life’s purpose and what is God’s will for me?” If they do that, they end up stressing themselves out and thinking themselves out of the game, thinking that they have to understand the meaning of life at 12 months sober; or that they should have a roadmap for their life drawn out, down to every little specific detail.

    It’s not that serious. Instead of concerning yourself with some huge existential question mark, keep it simple. Get off the bench, get back on the field and play. Before you know it, you’ll find yourself sober years later with a beautiful life filled with purpose and meaning. I can promise you that only because I’ve seen it happen for many of my junkie friends around me.

    My higher power doesn’t hate Pikachu. That’s just silly. If you believe in God, that’s cool. If you don’t, that’s cool too. Just find something greater than you when the days get dark in your life. Hey! Maybe it’s this story. Who knows.

    If nobody told you that they love you today: I do. I love you.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • New Opioid Laws Seek To Curb Overprescribing

    New Opioid Laws Seek To Curb Overprescribing

    Though there is no hard evidence of the effectiveness of the laws yet, some professionals see the numbers as heading in the right direction.

    As the opioid epidemic has continued to claim lives, more than two dozen states have put laws in place in the hope of limiting the damage.

    Of those two dozen, the most recent states to take action are Florida, Michigan and Tennessee, according to Harvard Health Publishing. The new rules put in place set limits for the amount of opioids medical professionals can prescribe for pain relief from surgery, injury or illness. 

    Opioid laws vary from state to state, according to Harvard Health. While most states limit first-time opioid prescriptions to seven days, some states, such as Florida, Kentucky and Minnesota, have shortened it to three days unless a medical professional can give reason for a week-long supply.

    “For almost all acute pain problems, including after surgery, a week is usually sufficient,” Dr. Edgar Ross, senior clinician at the Pain Management Center at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital, told Harvard Health. 

    Additionally, some states have put procedures in place that require doctors to take more steps when prescribing. In Florida, both physicians and pharmacists are required to take courses about prescribing practices. They must also search a drug database to make sure doctors aren’t doubling up on prescriptions for patients.

    Massachusetts has a similar procedure in place, but some medical professionals say it’s not as simple as it sounds. 

    “We have the ability to check the registry to see who else has prescribed it, but it’s not integrated with electronic records,” Dr. Dennis Orgill, a surgeon at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital, told Harvard Health. “If you have someone who needs opioids over the weekend, you can imagine the logistics of that.” 

    Another new law, this one in Ohio, allows doctors to override and refill acute pain prescriptions, but only after a patient has gone through the first prescription.

    According to Harvard Health, patients will typically have to return to the doctor to get a prescription rather than getting a refill on the phone. If for some reason a refill is made over the phone, Harvard Health states patients will end up visiting the pharmacy more often and making more copays as a result.

    If doctors do not follow the new laws, they may face consequences. As a result, Harvard Health states some patients that need prescriptions for chronic pain are not getting them.

    “Many doctors now refuse to prescribe any opioids because of the fear of sanctions,” Ross told Harvard Health. “I have had several cancer patients whose pain was not well managed because of incorrect perceptions.” 

    Although there is no hard evidence of the effectiveness of the laws yet, some professionals see the numbers as heading in the right direction.

    “Massachusetts’ opioid legislation was signed into law in March of 2016. The overdose death rate then decreased by 8.3% in 2017, the first decrease since the beginning of the opioid epidemic,” Dr. Karsten Kueppenbender, an addiction psychiatrist at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital, told Harvard Health. “While it’s impossible to say the law caused the decrease, it’s certainly a welcome association.” 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Bananas Donated To Prison Contained $18M Worth of Cocaine

    Bananas Donated To Prison Contained $18M Worth of Cocaine

    The two unclaimed pallets of ripe bananas were filled with a lot more than potassium. 

    A Texas prison got much more than it bargained for, when a shipment of donated bananas bound for the penitentiary was found to contain nearly $18 million worth of cocaine. 

    “Sometimes, life gives you lemons. Sometimes, it gives you bananas. And sometimes, it gives you something you’d never expect!” the Texas Department of Criminal Justice wrote in a Facebook post.

    According to NPR, representatives from the Ports of America in Freeport, Texas contacted the department when two pallets’ worth of ripe bananas were left unclaimed at the port. The port agreed to donate the fruit to the Wayne Scott Unit prison farm in Brazoria County so they could be consumed before they went bad. 

    “Two sergeants of the Scott Unit arrived to pick them up, and discovered something not quite right,” the department wrote. 

    When the correctional officers were loading the 45 boxes of bananas, one noticed that a particular box felt different.

    “They snipped the straps, pulled free the box, and opened it up. Inside, under a bundle of bananas, he found another bundle! Inside that? What appeared to be a white powdery substance,” the department wrote. 

    That led to the whole shipment being searched and authorities found 540 packages of cocaine with a street value of $17.8 million. 

    “U.S. Customs arrived on the scene, and the substance tested positive for cocaine,” the department wrote. “Customs agents then searched each box on the two pallets, and they were all ripe and loaded. Once all 45 boxes had been emptied, what was left was quite the cache.”

    The department praised the attentiveness of the corrections officers who followed his gut.

    “With an instinct that something just wasn’t quite right, our guys uncovered 540 packages of cocaine within the shipment, with an estimated street value of $17,820,000!” the department wrote. 

    The Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Customs and Border Protection are investigating the cocaine shipment. They have not released where the shipment came from or who the intended recipient was.

    Apparently, shipping cocaine in bananas is relatively common. In April, Spanish police seized nearly 9 tons of cocaine in a shipment of bananas from Colombia. Albanian, Romanian and German police have also uncovered cocaine in banana shipments shipped from Colombia, the largest producer of cocaine.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • NYC Welcomes Public To Marijuana "Listening Sessions"

    NYC Welcomes Public To Marijuana "Listening Sessions"

    The public’s feedback will help state officials draft legislation to legalize marijuana in New York.

    New York is hosting “listening sessions” across the state to gather the public’s input on marijuana legalization.

    The Regulated Marijuana Listening Sessions will run from September to mid-October across New York state, as Governor Andrew Cuomo announced in August.

    “Community input is critical as we work to draft balanced and comprehensive legislation on a regulated marijuana program in New York,” Cuomo said at the time.

    A July report commissioned by Cuomo—the Assessment of the Potential Impact of Regulated Marijuana in New York State—concluded that the positive impacts of a regulated marijuana market outweigh the possible negative impacts, according to a press release issued in August by the governor’s office.

    The feedback from the public will inform the Regulated Marijuana Workgroup, which will draft legislation to legalize marijuana in New York, that will be considered by the state legislature in the upcoming session.

    “The multi-agency report identified the benefits of a regulated marijuana market, and with these listening sessions we are taking another important step to develop a model program for New York. We look forward to hearing what New Yorkers in every corner of the state have to say,” said Cuomo.

    New York currently has a medical marijuana program in place, albeit with several limitations. Home cultivation, smokable medical marijuana, and edible products are not allowed under the program.

    The report—which assessed the impact of a legal marijuana system in New York from a health, economic, public safety and criminal justice perspective—also stated that potential areas of concern can be mitigated through regulation and public education.

    “Input from communities in every region of the state is an essential part of our approach to a regulated marijuana program,” said Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul in August. “With a thoughtful process, New York is moving forward to craft a policy that will ensure continued progress across our state.”

    The remaining listening sessions are listed below:

    Sept. 26 – Staten Island

    Sept. 27 – Long Island

    Oct. 1 – Newburgh

    Oct. 2 – Binghamton

    Oct. 3 – Buffalo

    Oct. 4 – Rochester

    Oct. 9 – Syracuse

    Oct. 10 – Utica

    Oct. 11 – Watertown

    For more information on locations and pre-registration, visit the New York state website.

    View the original article at thefix.com