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> By contrast, there has been a near tripling of American deaths from heroin overdoses between 2010 and 2013, even though the law and its severe punishments rem

• iolothebard 11y ago
  Making Oxycontin harder to get is why. Also people trying to get clean, then going back to doing their "old" dose.
  • Tenhundfeld 11y ago
    Yes, exactly, on both points. According to the CDC, opioid painkillers addicts are 40 times more likely to be addicted to heroin than general population. “Most heroin users have a history of nonmedical use of prescription opioid pain relievers, and an increase in the rate of heroin overdose deaths has occurred concurrently with an epidemic of prescription opioid overdoses." I can't say opioid painkillers are the only reason, but the experts seem to agree they're, at least, a major contributing factor. I was listening to a social worker discuss the problem recently. His experience was that most new heroin addicts started on opioid painkillers, often with legitimate prescriptions, and weren't hard drug users previously. When their doctor refused to prescribe more painkillers (or the pills they were stealing from mom ran out, etc.), they turned to the black market, where it's much easier to obtain heroin than painkillers. He estimated 90% of his cases fit this pattern of prescription drugs being the gateway to heroin. This same guy also discussed how a lot of overdoses he saw were from recovered heroin addicts that relapsed after being prescribed an opioid painkiller for a legitimate need, e.g., after an injury. As you say, they went back to their "old dose," without realizing a) their tolerance was lower and b) black market heroin is typically much better quality and a wider range of qualities these days. In the 80's (and 90's I think) heroin was usually <10% pure (i.e., 90% filler/other), but heroin on the streets today is often around 30% but sometimes as high as 70%. I don't remember the exact numbers, something close to that. He said you could tell when a super pure batch of heroin came through town, because overdoses would spike. Another factor I've read, can't remember where, is that the higher quality heroin has made snorting it more feasible. So, that reduces some of the stigma/ickiness associated with needles, trackmarks, etc., increasing the pool of people who'll try it. And it can be easier to overdose via snorting, because it takes several minutes to feel the full effects, unlike injecting.
• humbleMouse 11y ago
  "Street dealers don't really sell weed as they used to now that better and legal weed exist, so they went on heroin." This is an extremely misguided statement. The demand for high quality weed has never been higher. It doesn't matter if you legalize it, because you are still taxing it 50%. The individual sellers and producers will keep doing their thing. I can tell you right now that people who sell weed don't just magically start selling heroin. The types of people who sell weed are TOTALLY different that the types of people who sell heroin. Yes, some people exist who sell both - but those types of dealers have been selling every kind of drug they can get their hands on and will never stop. I think you need to take another look at the supply and demand of high quality marijuana. It is hard to consistently produce high quality marijuana - and once you do cure it correctly and get it packaged, it flies off the shelf as fast as you can answer your phone, regardless of if you are in a state where it is legal or not. Furthermore, there are many people who deliver marijuana on bikes and in cars and make a very good living. These people are not going to loose business to legal dispensaries I can guarantee you. There is always demand for reliable dealers who deliver high quality to you asap. Independent producers and dealers will be able to consistently undercut dispensary prices because the government is taxing it 50%. Combined with the value of delivery and you are not going to see marijuana dealers switch to selling heroin because weed is legalized.... it doesnt work that way. Two completely different clientele/lifestyle/risk factors.
  • DanBC 11y ago
    > The demand for high quality weed has never been higher. A minor point, but cannabis use has gone down.
    • humbleMouse 11y ago
      Sources?
      • DanBC 11y ago
        https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/462885/drug-misuse-1415.pdf https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachm... Key findings, page 1 > Around 1 in 12 (8.6%) adults aged 16 to 59 had taken an illicit drug in the last year. This equated to around 2.8 million people. This level of drug use was similar to the 2013/14 survey (8.8%), but significantly lower than a decade ago (11.2% in the 2004/05 survey). Cannabis, page 3 (The chart on that page is pretty clear.) > As in previous years, cannabis was the most commonly used drug in the last year, with 6.7 per cent of adults aged 16 to 59 using it in the last year, similar to the 2013/14 survey (6.6%; Figure 1.2). Over the longer-term, between the 1998 and 2003/04 surveys, the last year use of cannabis was stable, at around 10 per cent of adults, before falling to 6.5 per cent in 2009/10. The trend since the 2009/10 survey has been relatively flat, at between six and seven per cent (Table 1.02). > Among younger adults aged 16 to 24, cannabis was also the most commonly used drug, with 16.3 per cent having used it in the last year. This was not statistically significantly different from the level in 2013/14 (15.1%), but was a significant fall compared with the 1996 survey (25.8%). > Although the trend in the use of cannabis among 16 to 24 year olds appears to have shown a steady increase compared with the 2012/13 survey, it is too early to conclude that this is an emerging pattern at this stage. The estimates from the 2012/13 survey appear to be out of line with recent results, and a comparison of the latest estimate to previous years may indicate that the trend, which has been falling since the peak in 1998, has gradually stabilised (Table 1.06). For the US: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/13/teen-marijuana-use-flat_n_5492135.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/13/teen-marijuana-use-... (sorry about huffpo. CDC need to have a better website.) > The biennial High School Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed that the rate of marijuana use among U.S. high school students remained virtually unchanged from 2011 to 2013. It's also about 3 percent less than the peak of teen marijuana use in 1999, when nearly 27 percent of teens said they had recently used marijuana, according to the CDC data. > In 2013, 23.4 percent of American high-school-aged teens used marijuana one or more times in the 30 days before the survey, the data show. That's nearly even with 23.1 percent in 2011.