Happy Thanksgiving: Today, Vancouver Becomes the First North American City to Prescribe Heroin

[grahamhgreen]

http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2014/11/26/today-vancouver-becomes-the-first-north-american-city-to-prescribe-heroin-to-addicts-since-the-drug-war-began

The results of the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, showed that 95.2 percent of the research participants receiving heroin stuck with the program while only 54.1 of those taking methadone did.

Dr. Scott MacDonald, who was involved in the trial, has told reporters that bringing stability to the participants' lives gives them the opportunity to reconnect with their families and perhaps even begin building towards further educational or job opportunities.

"I think all the clinicians at the clinic have seen the great beneficial effect that this treatment can have on people — hard-to-reach populations that may have been using on the streets for 15, 20, 25, even 30 years," he told the CBC. "It is very dangerous and life-destroying to have to ingest in an alley, to use illicit heroin three, four times a day. That destroys lives. This is an alternative."

Vancouver has long been an epicenter of progressive thinking about drug policy and drug addiction. Dr. Martin Schechter, president of the School of Public Health at the University of British Columbia, has argued for years that the most destructive harms of heroin use don't come from the drug itself—they come from the fact that the drug is illegal.

[Comrade Grumpy]

1. The stuff should be legally obtainable.

"the most destructive harms of heroin use don't come from the drug itself—they come from the fact that the drug is illegal."

Which is not to say that heroin use can't be problematic. The stuff is physically addictive, and it can kill you.

Still, there is no reason to be arresting people for using heroin. We need to keep the cops out it, except to clean up the messes. That's what we do with alcohol. Only with heroin, the messes are likely to be less messy. Heroin users might drive while impaired, which the cops should stop, but they're much less likely than alcohol users to do really crazy, obnoxious, violent things.

[grahamhgreen]

2. I think Portugal has proven decrim works: drug abuse down by half after 10 years:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/07/05/ten-years-after-decriminalization-drug-abuse-down-by-half-in-portugal/

[LawDeeDah]

3. Huge K&R

This is how humans should treat each other - to help each other out, to be compassionate and understanding.

I just loathing hate those opposite thinkers to that -the teabaggers the fuckertarians and the likes of McTurtles all over.

[olddots]

4. but but big pharma needs more profit

It's all about money .

[Zorra]

5. Will the heroin be free? If it's not, the junkies will still steal anything they can to pay for it.

I had the misfortune to be acquainted with James Fogle, the hopeless sociopathic criminal junkie who wrote "Drugstore Cowboy". He was working on another book called "House of Worms", a fiction novel with a storyline about a facility where junkies voluntarily commit themselves, and could get all the free heroin they wanted as long as they stayed in the prison like facility. If they wanted to leave the facility, they had to voluntarily move to another wing of the facility, and had to stay there, and stay clean, for a year. Fogle never finished the book, as far as I know, but I've always thought that it was an idea worth exploring further.

I feel sorry for heroin addicts, but honestly, I don't want them anywhere near me, my family, or anyone else. Most of them are conscienceless thieves with a marriage like lifetime commitment to heroin. I imagine that the wealthy ones aren't so bad, they don't need to steal in order to get high. If street junkies get a scrip for heroin they'll end up selling a little of it to high school kids if need be, so they have a little spare change for a few cigarettes and maybe a candy bar between fixes.

One of my ex-bandmates befriended one, and brought him to our band house once, and the rotten piece of shit fucker ended up stealing a coin collection I'd had since I was a kid, stole the kids piggy banks, and basically anything else of value that he could put in a backpack. He was very charismatic and engaging, in the way that sociopathic con men generally are.

I hate heroin, it's fucking satan incarnate, and I really hope this prescription program works, it will be worth paying for if it keeps the junkies from stealing kids' bicycles, spreading aids with dirty needles, and puts dealers out of business.

This may sound harsh, but believe me, never trust anyone who is addicted to heroin, or they will disappoint you big time.

[Comrade Grumpy]

6. Heroin isn't very expensive to produce. It's the illegality that makes it expensive.

You could probably supply every junkie in America for less than it costs to keep a hundred of them in jail for a year.

That said, I'm not too fond of thieving junkies, either. I used to live in Washington, DC, for awhile, and recall signs in people's car windows: "Somebody already stole the car radio. Please don't break my window again for nothing. Thank you."

[Eleanors38]

7. Heroin™ is trademarked by Bayer in Germany.

It was meant to be a prescribed medicine.