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> Analyzing a dataset of over 1.5 billion individual opioid prescriptions between 2011 and 2018, which were aggregated to the individual provider-year level, we

• claudeganon 7y ago
  >I don’t understand why federal legalization has been so difficult. Alcohol and opioid manufacturing buying off politicians. Mass incarceration as a policy to preserve slavery in the US economy and to serve as a jobs program for police and guard forces.
  • TylerE 7y ago
    Not only that, but the Prison-Industrial complex is a real thing. Private prisons are an outrage.
    • jdminhbg 7y ago
      Private prisons only account for ~8% (and falling) of US prisoners[0]. Their incentives are bad, but public prisons have just as many self-interested groups with even more political power[1]. [0]: https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-united-states/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-priso... [1]: e.g. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/02/biggest-obstacle-prison-reform-labor-unions/ https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/02/biggest-obstacl...
  • eagsalazar2 7y ago
    So sad that this is the right answer.
• rectang 7y ago
  > I don’t understand why federal legalization has been so difficult. Drug laws are enforced unequally across different racial groups. Those who benefit from oppressing racial minorities, especially via voter suppression through felony disenfranchisement, are understandably reluctant to relinquish their tools.
  • 09bjb 7y ago
    "Those" have admitted it publicly too: https://qz.com/645990/nixon-advisor-we-created-the-war-on-drugs-to-criminalize-black-people-and-the-anti-war-left/ https://qz.com/645990/nixon-advisor-we-created-the-war-on-dr...
    • rectang 7y ago
      For what it's worth, I used "those" rather than naming names because that way it is easier to keep to the specific issue and avoid descending into partisan warfare — which is more in the spirit of the HN guidelines.
      • 09bjb 7y ago
        Haha, well, when it starts with "oppressing racial minorities, especially via voter suppression through felony disenfranchisement" ...just follow the data ;)
      • hanniabu 7y ago
        While I respect the guidelines, we shouldn't be suppressing awareness and dirty tactics
    • dsfyu404ed 7y ago
      IIRC this quote has been discredited.
      • abbadadda 7y ago
        Why is this your about? It makes you seem confrontational. I read abouts for all types of reasons. I clicked on your username to see the likelihood that you're a bot ;-) > If you're reading this odds are it's because you're incapable of having a well reasoned debate with someone who doesn't share your point of view.
• save_ferris 7y ago
  Lobbying by the pharma and alcohol industries has been one of largest impediments to progress on cannabis. There’s a tremendous amount of money that does not want legalization to happen.
  • ancorevard 7y ago
    Nonsense. Pharma will greatly benefit from the increase in number of schizophrenia patients. Cannabis is a well established trigger among people whose genes are latent for schizophrenia or other psychosis. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4604190/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4604190/
    • 09bjb 7y ago
      Nonsense. The number of potential marijuana users that would stand to benefit vastly outnumbers the number of potential users who have a psychotic break in their future that could be accelerated by marijuana or another psychotropic drug. Which, yes, is an acknowledged risk of many of these substances.
      • beenBoutIT 7y ago
        The idea that any drug is capable of permanently transforming a sane individual into a psychotic lunatic is pure bullshit. If there was a substance capable of such magic it would have been weaponized long ago and political dissidents would all wind up insane as opposed to dead in places like modern day Russia, China, etc.
        • catalogia 7y ago
          > political dissidents would all wind up insane as opposed to dead in places like modern day Russia, China, etc. I don't think it's safe to assume these regimes would favor chemically induced insanity over murder/assassination/execution. For starters, induced insanity wouldn't provide a supply of organs. For another, those in power might fear that the procedure could become reversible, or may have efficacy that wears off over time (these fears may well be ungrounded but still sufficient motivation.) This is to say, there is a finality to death that's hard to match. Furthermore, if it only works "naturally" on a small segment of the population then it's not a forgone conclusion that Putin could snap his fingers and have it weaponized such that it's effective on everybody. Also keep in mind that inducing insanity reliably can already be done today using very primitive technology. Prolonged sensory deprivation, or even just social isolation, takes a hard toll on people. That's a pretty reliable mechanism from what I understand, and is considered a heinous form torture by many, yet these governments still choose kill people. They could also give people lobotomies or fry their brains [ab]using electroconvulsive therapy, but they still choose to kill people.
• virmundi 7y ago
  Normal reason: brown people like weed. https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/drug-law-reform/marijuana-legalization-racial-justice-issue https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/drug-law-refor...
  • chongli 7y ago
    .
    • virmundi 7y ago
      Brown people historically refer to blacks and Latinos in the US.
    • chishaku 7y ago
      Depends on the context.
    • deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
• dgzl 7y ago
  I think it's because the people in charge just don't understand or care about the culture. They see the few problems that stem from marijuana and write off the entire idea. Only slowly has marijuana crept into the mainstream for who we might consider "adults."
• Reedx 7y ago
  > As a former marijuana user this seems obvious to me That's a key point, you've used it and have actual experience with it. Marijuana has long been misunderstood and misinformation abound, but as more people use it or know those who do, that's been quickly changing. Add to that increasing medical evidence and more doctors coming onboard. It's just a matter of time now. Indeed it seems we've already hit the tipping point. Public opinion flipped in recent years on whether it should be legalized, most are now in support: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/11/14/americans-support-marijuana-legalization/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/11/14/americans-s...
• __s 7y ago
  "Good people don't smoke marijuana" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGx72wL4gx4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGx72wL4gx4
  • hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
    I don't feel like there is much that unites the left and right in American politics these days, except for perhaps anything said by Jeff Sessions is a pretty strong argument that the opposite opinion is the correct answer.
• 09bjb 7y ago
  No, your Portugal-model belief isn't that "out there." In my (subjective) opinion, once you do your homework on the issue you come away assuming that the continued scheduling of drugs with low addictive potential and high potential for therapeutic use is due to: 1. The healthcare and pharmaceutical profits at stake if people needed less care and fewer prescription pharmaceuticals 2. Cultural momentum excluding Alcohol from being considered a drug (LOL) and approving of drugs that support the protestant work ethic and existing labor system (caffeine, nicotine, and prescription amphetamines to stay alert on the job and alcohol to wind down in the evening), plus the cultural momentum of billions of dollars and decades spent on a pointless and damaging "War on Drugs" 3. The threat that psychedelics in particular pose to existing authority structures: high self-respect, beliefs that each human is as worthy as the next, and the ability to imagine less authoritarian systems are all threatening to the existing system. Tim Leary wasn't wrong when he said that (users) "won't fight your wars, won't join your corporations" ~~~~~ There are five different schedules of controlled substances, numbered I–V. The CSA describes the different schedules based on three factors: Potential for abuse: How likely is this drug to be abused? Accepted medical use: Is this drug used as a treatment in the United States? Safety and potential for addiction: Is this drug safe? How likely is this drug to cause addiction? What kinds of addiction?
  • dangus 7y ago
    Please don’t use code blocks for quotes, they’re impossible to read on mobile.
    • grogenaut 7y ago
      If people are going to complain about this, why isn't it in the posting instructions? In fact I don't see any posting instructions.
      • vinceguidry 7y ago
        They're not all that easy to read on desktop either. The real issue is that code isn't intended to wrap naturally, while prose is. Prose doesn't belong in code blocks.
• doc_gunthrop 7y ago
  > I don’t understand why federal legalization has been so difficult. Look into the history of laws surrounding marijuana in the United States and you'll start to understand the politics behind it. For example, here's a statement from John Ehrlichman[1], Assistant of Domestic Affairs to former president Richard Nixon. > “You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman
  • refurb 7y ago
    Pretty sure this quote has been discredited. Some reporter said he said it, but after he died, so it can’t be confirmed. His family says that quote doesn’t sound like him at all. Even if he did say it, it’s one guys opinion and doesn’t reflect gov’t policy.
    • mehrdadn 7y ago
      > Pretty sure this quote has been discredited. By whom? (Citation?) This is the first time I'm hearing that.
      • refurb 7y ago
        https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/32247/did-ehrlichman-claim-the-reason-for-the-nixon-drug-war-was-to-criminalize-black https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/32247/did-ehrli...
        • 7y ago
• simonh 7y ago
  Except the Portuguese model, which I’m in favour of, does not ‘decriminalise drugs’. It decriminalises drug use, while still keeping hard drugs illegal to sell or exchange for a profit. What this does is keep users out if prisons and protects medical and social services professionals that help them with e.g. clean needles. I do think the decriminalisation of the sale of marijuana is a reasonable step, but it’s fundamentally got nothing to do with the Portuguese model. Norway seems to be taking the same route, so hopefully we’ll see more data to back up the success of this model in future.
  • dvduval 7y ago
    If I understand correctly about Portugal, I believe people can obtain drugs legally at government locations where they distribute the drug, but also have the ability to receive treatment for addiction. I don't know if there are some drugs like marijuana they can buy legally, or if even marijuana is illegal. Surely there aren't a bunch of people obtaining marijuana for free at the government office? Or are they?
    • simonh 7y ago
      I think Portugal prescribes some substitute drugs like methodone to some addicts as part of rehabilitation therapy, but this isn’t unique to Portugal and isn’t really a significant part of the overall strategy except to treat addiction as primarily a health issue. Of course that’s a lot easier to do in countries with universal health care. I wish we took this approach more here in the UK.
      • GordonS 7y ago
        > I wish we took this approach more here in the UK As do I, but given UK politics, it's unlikely to happen. Both Labour and the Conservatives jump on drug control as a political points scoring mechanism, fueled (as always) by the tabloid press. As usual, it's "politics before people". The fairly recent Psychoactive Substances Act, which makes just about everything illegal (except alcohol, caffeine, nicotine), shows just how progressive drug policy is in the UK.
• ngokevin 7y ago
  There are a few presidential candidates that are for it, including mushrooms: https://www.yang2020.com/policies/decriminalizeopioids/ https://www.yang2020.com/policies/decriminalizeopioids/
• Consultant32452 7y ago
  There's a small percentage of the population for which marijuana triggers psychosis. I support legalization of all drugs regardless of their safety, but it's important not to generalize too widely based on personal experience. Marijuana presents a different but important risk set when compared to alcohol or tobacco.
  • amanaplanacanal 7y ago
    For those who are susceptible any strong or traumatic experience can trigger psychosis, including leaving home for college. I don’t think that’s a good argument against going to college though.
    • posterboy 7y ago
      There's a decision of the German high court finding there's no inalienable right to get high. However, the right to an education is a fundamental human right. I'm not saying I understand or agree with the fundamental arguments. In fact, I don't think there aren't any arguments that were not subjective. I'd say moderate intoxication is not a necessary evil. School is, though. Well, mild intoxication, for lack of a better word, is inavoidable. School is avoidable though. Speaking from personal experience I find drug use and learning can be at odds very much. The topics are interrelated. And your comparison is backwards. If you are really saying: There can be good reasons not to go to college, but these don't generalize--whatever reasons those may be; Then we can prohibit drug use, if we can make school compulsory. There's no equivalence. I mean how ridiculuous would it sound that, we must get these people high!? We must let them have relieve at the cost of a few failed existences--sounds not much better. It's OK in case of college, because we need that to reduce the need for it--something like that, if not to cure alzheimer. At this point I note that my idea of drug use chiefly to get high might strike someone as odd and in need of regulation. That's what they call for, after all, control, information, responsibility. What would that look like in practice? Only one way to find out, you have to inform yourself. The message that it's bad and hence illegal is therefore the simplest. It does not incur any further responsibility for the emitter, but leaves it completely with the user: It incures duty in prisons--that's the users fault, they didn't have to. Prohibition is a reasonable form of control, too. Because, first those who must participate will find a way any way, whether to their own detriment or not. And then, getting caught should always follow a prior fuck up. Import a substance that sells at the price of, I don't know, alluminum, although it's literally peanuts--hell yeah you are morally corrupt. And I don't see the price coming down after legilization. Whereas getting imprisoned for possession is rather difficult where I'm from, so it's a proxy for worse offenses that get one in the spotlight, often enough. Perhaps price is a measure of control. If time is money, then an economist sees a lot of time going to waste; perhaps even in colleges and business schools. Thereby I've achieved reduction ad absurdum, commiting to the same falacious comparison as you. If there's anything else I wanted to say, could have or should've said, the I forgot. My memory is very bad, sorry. I blame information technology, and a sped up aging process.
• pier25 7y ago
  There is a fundamental truth society and lawmakers refuse to ignore. People that want to consume drugs will do so regardless of the legality of it. It would be much healthier for everyone (drug users and non drugs users) to simply acknowledge this truth.
  • Haga 7y ago
    The problem is that once drugs start to overwrite the personality, the users start to promote their life style to everyone, expanding the problem. This leads to a new wave of addiction once the knowledge vaccination fades with the generations.
• seganddr 7y ago
  Billionaire Sheldon Adelson contributes a lot of money to "conservative" politicians as long as they're anti drug. His son died of an overdose. https://theintercept.com/2016/11/02/sheldon-adelson-fights-marijuana-legalization-while-funding-pro-marijuana-research/ https://theintercept.com/2016/11/02/sheldon-adelson-fights-m...
• GuB-42 7y ago
  Just to clear a common misunderstanding. Portugal decriminalized drug use. Meanings that drugs are still illegal, it is just that you won't face a court of law and you won't go to jail, but you can still get punished, for example with a fine. Also, if you have more than a small amount of drugs, it is considered trafficking and it is still a crime in Portugal. With jail time. And there is no exception for cannabis, it is illegal just like crack and heroin.