14 ms·

60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

211 points by carlmungz 9y ago

TaylorGood 9y ago
Read all the timestamps this morning. It's a sobering view on something we are already aware of. Not sure how this issue rids itself. Circling back on my gratitude to be healthy.
new_hackers 9y ago
Wow, just wow. As someone not affected by the heroin epidemic, this was very hard to read. I was almost brought to tears at how many stories involved children of heroin users and how their lives are affected.
- prawn 9y ago
  The children celebrating a birthday in a time-limited jail room got me. They're a similar age to my own children. It's probably far better than a lifetime of health issues, but it seriously saddened me that those children didn't get to do that at their pace, in their family home, without third-party supervision, with friends, etc. Their "normal" gets entirely defined by mistakes of their parents compounded by their parents' inability to control that mistake.
- grahamburger 9y ago
  I thought I was also not affected by the heroin epidemic. Last week my son's best friend's mom died in a heroin related incident. They're in first grade (6 years old). Heartbreaking.
baldfat 9y ago
Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and child in the state.
- humbleMouse 9y ago
  Holy crap that's insane. That's 72 pills per year for each man woman and child.
  - DanBC 9y ago
    The US uses more than 99% of the world supply of hydrocodone. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/15/americans-use-far-more-opioids-than-anyone-else-in-the-world/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/15/ameri...
    - majormajor 9y ago
      Having recovered from surgery both with- and without-hydrocodone, it's not hard to understand why. It works really really well as a painkiller. I hope there is a solution that can address addiction and abuse without eliminating the drug itself. A less judgmental approach than spiking it with acetaminophen which just makes abuse do even more damage. I have similar mixed feelings about prescription stimulants. They work, but a lot of people end up abusing them.
  - replicatorblog 9y ago
    I've seen this stat repeated quite a bit, but a person with chronic pain might take 2-4 pills a day right? Assuming 28 pills a week, that figure doesn't seem as crazy. Perhaps this is an insane quantity, but it feels like a stat that could be made to sound scarier than it is by using proper vocal intonation.
    - amigoingtodie 9y ago
      If that were really true, the drug distributors would not be settling with the state.
    - humbleMouse 9y ago
      I see the point you're trying to make - but have you ever taken 2-4 opiate pills per day for over a couple weeks at a time? This has a terrible ravaging effect on your body. It's not good for anybody, regardless of how much pain they are in. Furthermore, opiate tolerance goes up very quickly and that 2-4 pills can turn into 4-8 very quickly.
mschuster91 9y ago
Shocking to read. But what really shocks me is the amount of arrests mentioned for possession of heroin or syringes. When will the US (and the rest of the world) finally learn that locking users up just perpetuates the problem - you won't get a job with a criminal record, same for housing. All this arresting does is fill the coffers of (private) jails and creates needless suffering. Also, why do people keep calling the cops on relatives and friends who OD? That just makes the problem worse. In fact, it should be made illegal to arrest anyone when emergency services are called to an OD, and this must be publically announced. People rather let other people die than save their lives because they're afraid of jail. > She’s part of a protest against Butler County Sheriff Rick Jones, who won’t let his deputies carry Narcan. He's the only sheriff in southwest Ohio whose department doesn't use it. Two doses of Narcan cost about $75. And, what kind of person is this moron? He should be in jail for willfully preventing deaths! > “Either she got a new dealer, or her dealer hosed her,” a paramedic says. Yet another case for why it 'd be really necessary that the state provides drugs like heroin, with proper quality control. So many deaths and near-deaths that could be avoided.
- tyingq 9y ago
  >Also, why do people keep calling the cops on relatives and friends who OD? They probably call 911 in the US, and the dispatcher is deciding who to send. Is there something that suggests otherwise? Separate from OD cases, though, friends and family DO often try to turn in loved ones. Addiction often turns your loved ones into genuine risks for other family members. And, sadly, jail is often the only existing place to send them if you can't have them in your house.
  - mschuster91 9y ago
    > They probably call 911 in the US, and the dispatcher is deciding who to send. Is there something that suggests otherwise? Ah, that explains it. In Germany, it's split - 110 calls the cops, and 112 medical/fire services. > And, sadly, jail is often the only existing place to send them if you can't have them in your house. It's a short-term fix, unfortunately. People suffering from addiction issues should not be in jail, they should be in a medical facility or whatever, as long as it does not appear on background checks.
rhcom2 9y ago
> They’ve tried spraying naloxone into his nostrils, but it’s had no effect. He’s not breathing. They’re running out of time. > One of the medics takes a drill out of his bag and turns it on. It whirs like a dental drill as he pushes it into the man’s shin bone, trying to create a more direct path for the naloxone to enter the bloodstream. Wow. Just wow. edit: more info, I'd never heard of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intraosseous_infusion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intraosseous_infusion
- carbocation 9y ago
  We place intraosseous (IO) lines as a crash line during cardiac arrests when we don't already have adequate access. Done right, they permit resuscitation without as much delay as gaining central venous access would require.
- Balgair 9y ago
  Pretty cool huh?! They used to have to auger the bit right into the bone by hand. As you can imagine, trying to twist them into the bone while the patient is alive is not easy. Also, once you punched through, there was usually enough momentum and force by the MD's hand, that they would then punch on through the other side of the bone and then right into their other hand that was stabilizing the procedure. Now you had two patients instead of one. Many MDs would really hesitate in doing it, as expected. These little sterile and disposable drill have saved a lot of lives. These are a 'poster boy' of modern bioengineering in general.
seldin87 9y ago
ibogaine. saved my life. it's sad more people don't know about this miracle. even sadder that government has chosen to outlaw the best available treatment for addiction that exists. please, if you or someone in your family suffers from drug addiction, especially heroin, please investigate ibogaine. seriously, just google it.
- free_everybody 9y ago
  The fact that ibogaine, a drug with little if any neurotoxicity, is a Schedule 1 drug in the U.S. while millions of opioid pills get handed out every year to hopelessly addicted poor people makes me very, VERY upset. Does your government care if you live or die?
  - vermontdevil 9y ago
    Only if you are an embryo.
    - mynameishere 9y ago
      What country are you in? In most Western countries, embryos are pretty much fair game.
      - burntrelish1273 9y ago
        I think it's a dig at the US Republican Christian Right, whom are "Pro-life" but anti-"taking care of that, or the mother's, life." Considering Republicans control the majority of all three branches of government, they have an opportunity to ram through their unpopular ideological agenda. Disclaimer: Neither party is currently relevant to the average US citizen. People ought to seek post-partisanship and post-identity to side-step divide-and-conquer polarization and unify to attack the corruption.
        bsder 9y ago
        > Disclaimer: Neither party is currently relevant to the average US citizen. People ought to seek post-partisanship and post-identity to side-step divide-and-conquer polarization and unify to attack the corruption. Horseshit. Both parties are NOT the same and one is quite relevant to the common citizen. For example: One party has been attempting to fix healthcare; one party is attempting to dismantle it. That's REALLY FUCKING RELEVANT to the average citizen--especially in red states--especially in states with an opiate epidemic. One party is attempting to legalize some drugs; the other continues to want to throw everybody in jail. I can go on. There is no such thing as "post-partisanship" until the Republican party starts operating on truth and fact, again. Could the Democrats be a lot better? Sure. However, I don't see Democrats assaulting people and still hanging onto their office. Weiner and Spitzer got chucked out of office for far less. Come talk to me about "post-partisanship" when Gianforte isn't in office anymore. Until then, I am quite free to assume that Republicans actually SUPPORT the current level of corruption.
CaliforniaKarl 9y ago
I was born in Cincinnati, and lived there for 18 years until going to Ohio State. Today I live on the peninsula. I'm here in Cincinnati now, for family stuff. And I'm concerned. Cincinnati still has a large industrial component (P&G has their HQ here), but many factories are gone. A lot of the east side of the city has been converted into microbreweries, homes, and shopping. My Mom works at a biomedical company that's growing. Gigabit FTTH for residences is available. I'm still concerned. Property taxes have grown beyond reasonable limits. There are so many areas that are not benefiting from the improvements being made. There is culture being destroyed by rising rents and gentrification. And the pain killer/opioid epidemic gives a perfect path to "release". Case in point: Today I met some relatives at a brewery for lunch. But my Aunt had a problem ordering: They send a text message when your order is ready to pick up, and she doesn't have a mobile phone. The place was all stools and tables; if we had invited my grandfather, he wouldn't have had a place to sit. There are good places and people though. I'm here to attend my grandmothers funeral. In addition to my boss, two of my relatives also had flowers sent by their place of work. On the day we were doing planning, my uncle suddenly shows up: My uncle builds furniture; he was sent by his place of work to pick up some big sandwich & pasta platters, and drop it off to my grandfather. All paid for. I'm rambling. The point is: There is so much good here, and it is so at risk. And sometimes I think that if I moved back here (either working remotely, or finding a similar job locally), that I would just exacerbate the problem.
- MarkPNeyer 9y ago
  I Also grew up in cincinnati. You've probably seen signs with my last name (Neyer) on them, as my family has been there a while. Also live in the bay area now. Cincinnati really was like a small town; people did seem to look after each other. I think if people like us moved back there to work for other tech companies, we'd exacerbate the problem. If we moved back and started companies that employed low skilled labor, we'd make things better. If we could end the pointless war on drugs, and spend that same money repairing infrastructure, we'd be way better off. Our old system is breaking down. Unfortunately i think it'll have to get worse before it gets better.
- cjy 9y ago
  I live in Cincinnati. I don't think gentrification is responsible for the opioid epidemic. I would blame the increase in the supply of opioids and structural changes to the economy. Plenty of places without gentrification (rural Indiana) are being hit even harder. I'd also disagree that moving back would exacerbate the problem. A higher tax base would help the city to better combat the problem. You could also donate to non-profits or volunteer.
spraak 9y ago
I always wonder what would happen if caffeine/caffeine containing products (coffee, tea etc.) were illegal. Would people go to the same extremes for a caffeine fix?
- spraak 9y ago
  I'm curious why this would be down voted.
  - SyneRyder 9y ago
    I gave you an upvote, as the question seems fair. But if you're a coffee/caffeine drinker, you can answer this for yourself by going without coffee for a couple of weeks. You'll miss it for a few days, but it's ultimately not something worth going to jail or having a hole drilled into your leg for.
mbgaxyz 9y ago
Moderators: This is a duplicate of an earlier post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15224794 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15224794 Which has the exact same URL: http://www.cincinnati.com/pages/interactives/seven-days-of-heroin-epidemic-cincinnati/ http://www.cincinnati.com/pages/interactives/seven-days-of-h... Is there a bug in the submission system?
- chipperyman573 9y ago
  If a page was recently submitted and didn't get many comments people can repost it.
eighthnate 9y ago
Is this journalism or just a publicity stunt for journalists? And why is everything a "battle", "war", etc. War against drugs. War against terror. Battle against heroin. And must everything be a "crisis". Maybe just knowing how the news industry works has me a bit cynical. Anyways there is always a "crisis". A few years ago, there was the meth crisis. A few years before that, the ecstasy crisis. Before that there was the crack crisis. Before that the marijuana crisis. All the way to opium. I guess as more things change, the more they stay the same.
julianz 9y ago
One thing not mentioned in the article is the size of the area and the population. I have no idea how big Cincinatti is or how many people live in those counties. So I don't know if those are big numbers or not.
- prawn 9y ago
  It's probably an oversight given they're writing first for a local audience?
nnfy 9y ago
For anyone who may be struggling with chronic pain and/or opioid addiction, I implore you to research kratom. As far as anyone can tell, it is safe, minimally addictive, and in my experience it is good for head pain, stomach pain, anxiety, minor depression, not to mention potentiation of all kinds of other drugs. Of course, use at your own risk. It may interact dangerously with many compounds, because it inhibits the cytochrome p450 enzyme. That said, after a six month up to three times a day habit, I've quit cold turkey twice without too much trouble. I recommend I highly if you're out of other options. One last warning, do not buy in person, you will be ripped off. You can get 250g for less than $30 online, and a dose for pain is 1-2 grams. Higher doses are mildly psychoactive, but OD is anecdotally impossible because you quickly become nauseaus and throw the powder up if you take in excess of 8-10+grams.
- xrd 9y ago
  I'm seeing lots of addicts wandering about Portland, OR. I read your comment with interest. I wonder if someone distributed this to addicts on the street if it would make a difference. I feel very helpless in reclaiming our city from an addiction crisis.
  - nnfy 9y ago
    There are numerous anecdotal reports online of heroin users using kratom to kick the habit. At the very least, one can be functional on kratom, contribute to society, and withdrawal shouldn't be terrible enough to motivate violent crime.
- tryckbarpingvin 9y ago
  Kratom saved my wife's life. She has suffered chronic pain* for the past few years. Literally near suicide from it, but doctors wouldn't prescribe anything, because they couldn't find anything wrong. We are still looking into the reason she's in such pain, but at least she has something that allows her to live not confined to the bed all day put of agony. She's finally moving around again, doing the dishes, etc. *edit
xrd 9y ago
Does anyone know of anyone using the drugs listed here (ibogaine was one) to help addicts? Because of the FDA, is this something illegal? It would be fascinating if cryptocurrencies permitted a black market for drug trade that allowed concerned citizens to buy these drugs and distribute them to addicts without fear of interference by the federal government. A silk road that we could all stand behind.
- xrd 9y ago
  That would be an interesting YC non profit.
- girvo 9y ago
  Anecdotally, the three people I know/knew who used ibogaine to get "clean" failed to various degrees. It truly seemed to help each of them to begin with, but after about 6 months each one of them relapsed -- probably due to the lack of counselling and dealing with the original reasons they started using to begin with, I'd wager. Two of them are dead from overdoses, the other I'm unsure, I haven't seen or heard from him in years now.
rocketperson7 9y ago
as a Lyft driver in Cincinnati, this is really making me rethink my main source of income most of my passengers during the day are lower income, and while I personally haven't had any major issues there are definitely times when I'm glad certain passengers are out of my car. I feel like if the drug problem is really this bad, it's only a matter of time until one of these stories is in the back of my car
csense 9y ago
When I went to school they made sure that Drugs Are Bad, Just Say No was a message that was hammered into every single child. Think about how our culture views drug addicts -- if you hear an acquaintance or a friend of a friend is doing drugs, especially heroin, do you think "Man, that person's got it together! I really want to be like them!" No, you think about how they're a shitty person living a shitty life and you want to stay far, far away from them, because you know they'll lie and steal from you to get their fix. So I don't really have sympathy for addicts. It's not like drug addiction is a thing that happens to you, unlike losing your home to a hurricane, or getting cancer. If you choose to shove a needle of heroin in your arm of your own free will, that's a choice you've made -- and the consequences of that choice are also things that you've chosen for yourself. It's not like that people don't know that drugs ruin lives. It's not like it's a secret that drugs are illegal and you'll get sent to jail. The area I grew up in is a Rust Belt town in similar circumstances -- maybe with even more drugs and less hope than Cincinnati. So I share my understanding and dismay of the economic situation that community's in. But drugs aren't the answer, and anyone who turns to them is clearly lacking in moral character and common sense.
- ZenoArrow 9y ago
  > "It's not like drug addiction is a thing that happens to you" A common route that leads people to taking heroin is... 1. Go to the doctor, get prescribed pain medication. 2. Become addicted to pain medication during treatment. 3. After supply of pain medication dries up, turn to illegal alternatives (which includes heroin). So it really could happen to anyone, as it's possible to become an addict without any prior intention to take illegal substances.
leggomylibro 9y ago
>Heroin is big business, but not for the Mexican immigrant Reagan is tailing today. He’s just a suspected courier who might make $500 or so. The real money flows to the gangs that control distribution, and to the drug cartels back in Mexico. >When they finally pull him over, police rip up the floor boards and dig through the driver’s back pack. They check the bumpers and the trunk and look for secret compartments in the doors. >Nothing. >Reagan is frustrated. There have to be drugs in that car, he thinks. Wait, they pulled someone over and destroyed their car over nothing? I hope they had some really solid evidence, but the article didn't say. >The agents don’t have time to dwell on what went wrong. About 7,000 kilograms of heroin are seized in the United States every year, three times as much as a decade ago. They will be hunting someone new tomorrow. Oh, okay then. They don't have time to dwell on what went wrong.
- BoiledCabbage 9y ago
  > They don't have time to dwell on what went wrong. But damnmit the bigger issue and what I'm really mad at is people protesting Police abuse! /s It's absurd how skewed this country has become in the "Police can do no wrong" mentality. When spoken in the abstract people are quick to say of course there is corruption and things can be improved in policing. But when it comes to specifics or even specific instances popular opinion and the justice system never fails to side with the police. And no, it's not just the conflict of interest for prosecutors that's at issue. We have a serious issue with the role of Police as public servants in this country. The (deliberate) pendulum swing to overly idolizing soldiers post-Vietnam, the declaration that police were now in a war against an inanimate object (drugs) including equipment and tactics, and the "otherization" / racial aspect have really made a perfect storm that is has now begun to spread out to society at large.
  - aklemm 9y ago
    It IS absurd and I'm with you in thinking it is a perfect storm. Possibly even a fundamental crisis of freedom. My latest tactic is to label these people "copsuckers". It makes me feel good anyway.
exikyut 9y ago
Wonder if anyone will see this, but I have a general question I might as well ask here. What if, you put an addicted person in a padded cell, and supply progressively decreasing doses of the drug(s) the person is addicted to? The dosage gradient could be mathematically computed to find the lowest possible harmful withdrawal effects. The person would stay in the cell environment until completely past the hardest phases of withdrawal (however long this takes, whether days, weeks, months(?)), but they would be free to move around (within the secure complex) as they please, and have limited access to technology (anything enabling communication would be heavily vetoed, but eg unlimited access to a video library could work well). It seems that the current models in use depend entirely on the will of a person who is heavily compromised. I honestly have to say, that seems fundamentally and ridiculously broken, and yeah, even suspiciously so: it's so obvious that this approach is not going to work for most, so why does every "treatment center" continue down this path? The only caveat I can think of with the suggestion above is about the violent phase of withdrawals, and sedating a person enough when in that phase so they can eat/drink/etc. (I'm not sure how long it is - I vaguely recall it's just a couple of days right?) Also, about the padded room - I'm not talking "psychotically mad-proof" padding, but just enough for this context. Obviously that's going to change per drug and person, and maybe thick padding is what would be required. I'm just thinking about cost here (cost of sedation and padding), because I know that a) everything health-related in the US seems to attract the most markup and overhead in any field in the world, and b) because (as per my notation that the current model is _suspiciously_ broken) I wouldn't be surprised if anyone who tried this would find it mysteriously hard to get funding. On the other hand, I must admit that I've never really tried to find out if this idea has been attempted or not. Would/does it not work?
- girvo 9y ago
  I am doing a version of this myself (minus the padded room), using buprenorphine under the supervision of an excellent case worker and doctor. It's taken 5 years, but I'm down to 1.6mg from 32mg at the start, and 24 works in the future I'll be off it entirely (and taking a month off to go down to my family's holiday home on the beach here in Australia, for the final withdrawal symptoms). One weird thing: even with my much lower dose, the acute withdrawals every morning are mostly the same. A little less bad, sure, but still rather terrible. I just put up with it, because it's better to be productive and able to move forward with my life after 6 years of heroin addiction than go back to where I was. Interestingly, opiate replacement therapy done with heroin itself has had quite good results. The downsides to buprenorphine and methadone is that the withdrawals are rather "drawn out" compared to heroin and morphine. The upside is that the fact they last so long in terms of binding is what makes them excellent at stopping a user from bouncing back and forward between the two (in theory anyway; a given users metabolism means this isn't always true. I could've easily used heroin any time during my treatment as I metabolise bupe and methadone extremely rapidly -- I just chose not to. It wasn't worth it.)
MaysonL 9y ago
And not one mention of doctors over-prescribing opioids!
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

211 points by carlmungz 9y ago

Read all the timestamps this morning. It's a sobering view on something we are already aware of. Not sure how this issue rids itself. Circling back on my gratitude to be healthy.

new_hackers 9y ago

Wow, just wow. As someone not affected by the heroin epidemic, this was very hard to read. I was almost brought to tears at how many stories involved children of heroin users and how their lives are affected.

prawn 9y ago
The children celebrating a birthday in a time-limited jail room got me. They're a similar age to my own children. It's probably far better than a lifetime of health issues, but it seriously saddened me that those children didn't get to do that at their pace, in their family home, without third-party supervision, with friends, etc. Their "normal" gets entirely defined by mistakes of their parents compounded by their parents' inability to control that mistake.
grahamburger 9y ago
I thought I was also not affected by the heroin epidemic. Last week my son's best friend's mom died in a heroin related incident. They're in first grade (6 years old). Heartbreaking.

baldfat 9y ago

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and child in the state.

humbleMouse 9y ago
Holy crap that's insane. That's 72 pills per year for each man woman and child.
- DanBC 9y ago
  The US uses more than 99% of the world supply of hydrocodone. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/15/americans-use-far-more-opioids-than-anyone-else-in-the-world/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/15/ameri...
  - majormajor 9y ago
    Having recovered from surgery both with- and without-hydrocodone, it's not hard to understand why. It works really really well as a painkiller. I hope there is a solution that can address addiction and abuse without eliminating the drug itself. A less judgmental approach than spiking it with acetaminophen which just makes abuse do even more damage. I have similar mixed feelings about prescription stimulants. They work, but a lot of people end up abusing them.
- replicatorblog 9y ago
  I've seen this stat repeated quite a bit, but a person with chronic pain might take 2-4 pills a day right? Assuming 28 pills a week, that figure doesn't seem as crazy. Perhaps this is an insane quantity, but it feels like a stat that could be made to sound scarier than it is by using proper vocal intonation.
  - amigoingtodie 9y ago
    If that were really true, the drug distributors would not be settling with the state.
  - humbleMouse 9y ago
    I see the point you're trying to make - but have you ever taken 2-4 opiate pills per day for over a couple weeks at a time? This has a terrible ravaging effect on your body. It's not good for anybody, regardless of how much pain they are in. Furthermore, opiate tolerance goes up very quickly and that 2-4 pills can turn into 4-8 very quickly.

mschuster91 9y ago

Shocking to read. But what really shocks me is the amount of arrests mentioned for possession of heroin or syringes. When will the US (and the rest of the world) finally learn that locking users up just perpetuates the problem - you won't get a job with a criminal record, same for housing. All this arresting does is fill the coffers of (private) jails and creates needless suffering. Also, why do people keep calling the cops on relatives and friends who OD? That just makes the problem worse. In fact, it should be made illegal to arrest anyone when emergency services are called to an OD, and this must be publically announced. People rather let other people die than save their lives because they're afraid of jail. > She’s part of a protest against Butler County Sheriff Rick Jones, who won’t let his deputies carry Narcan. He's the only sheriff in southwest Ohio whose department doesn't use it. Two doses of Narcan cost about $75. And, what kind of person is this moron? He should be in jail for willfully preventing deaths! > “Either she got a new dealer, or her dealer hosed her,” a paramedic says. Yet another case for why it 'd be really necessary that the state provides drugs like heroin, with proper quality control. So many deaths and near-deaths that could be avoided.

tyingq 9y ago
>Also, why do people keep calling the cops on relatives and friends who OD? They probably call 911 in the US, and the dispatcher is deciding who to send. Is there something that suggests otherwise? Separate from OD cases, though, friends and family DO often try to turn in loved ones. Addiction often turns your loved ones into genuine risks for other family members. And, sadly, jail is often the only existing place to send them if you can't have them in your house.
- mschuster91 9y ago
  > They probably call 911 in the US, and the dispatcher is deciding who to send. Is there something that suggests otherwise? Ah, that explains it. In Germany, it's split - 110 calls the cops, and 112 medical/fire services. > And, sadly, jail is often the only existing place to send them if you can't have them in your house. It's a short-term fix, unfortunately. People suffering from addiction issues should not be in jail, they should be in a medical facility or whatever, as long as it does not appear on background checks.

rhcom2 9y ago

> They’ve tried spraying naloxone into his nostrils, but it’s had no effect. He’s not breathing. They’re running out of time. > One of the medics takes a drill out of his bag and turns it on. It whirs like a dental drill as he pushes it into the man’s shin bone, trying to create a more direct path for the naloxone to enter the bloodstream. Wow. Just wow. edit: more info, I'd never heard of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intraosseous_infusion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intraosseous_infusion

carbocation 9y ago
We place intraosseous (IO) lines as a crash line during cardiac arrests when we don't already have adequate access. Done right, they permit resuscitation without as much delay as gaining central venous access would require.
Balgair 9y ago
Pretty cool huh?! They used to have to auger the bit right into the bone by hand. As you can imagine, trying to twist them into the bone while the patient is alive is not easy. Also, once you punched through, there was usually enough momentum and force by the MD's hand, that they would then punch on through the other side of the bone and then right into their other hand that was stabilizing the procedure. Now you had two patients instead of one. Many MDs would really hesitate in doing it, as expected. These little sterile and disposable drill have saved a lot of lives. These are a 'poster boy' of modern bioengineering in general.

seldin87 9y ago

ibogaine. saved my life. it's sad more people don't know about this miracle. even sadder that government has chosen to outlaw the best available treatment for addiction that exists. please, if you or someone in your family suffers from drug addiction, especially heroin, please investigate ibogaine. seriously, just google it.

free_everybody 9y ago
The fact that ibogaine, a drug with little if any neurotoxicity, is a Schedule 1 drug in the U.S. while millions of opioid pills get handed out every year to hopelessly addicted poor people makes me very, VERY upset. Does your government care if you live or die?
- vermontdevil 9y ago
  Only if you are an embryo.
  - mynameishere 9y ago
    What country are you in? In most Western countries, embryos are pretty much fair game.
    - burntrelish1273 9y ago
      I think it's a dig at the US Republican Christian Right, whom are "Pro-life" but anti-"taking care of that, or the mother's, life." Considering Republicans control the majority of all three branches of government, they have an opportunity to ram through their unpopular ideological agenda. Disclaimer: Neither party is currently relevant to the average US citizen. People ought to seek post-partisanship and post-identity to side-step divide-and-conquer polarization and unify to attack the corruption.
      - bsder 9y ago
        > Disclaimer: Neither party is currently relevant to the average US citizen. People ought to seek post-partisanship and post-identity to side-step divide-and-conquer polarization and unify to attack the corruption. Horseshit. Both parties are NOT the same and one is quite relevant to the common citizen. For example: One party has been attempting to fix healthcare; one party is attempting to dismantle it. That's REALLY FUCKING RELEVANT to the average citizen--especially in red states--especially in states with an opiate epidemic. One party is attempting to legalize some drugs; the other continues to want to throw everybody in jail. I can go on. There is no such thing as "post-partisanship" until the Republican party starts operating on truth and fact, again. Could the Democrats be a lot better? Sure. However, I don't see Democrats assaulting people and still hanging onto their office. Weiner and Spitzer got chucked out of office for far less. Come talk to me about "post-partisanship" when Gianforte isn't in office anymore. Until then, I am quite free to assume that Republicans actually SUPPORT the current level of corruption.

CaliforniaKarl 9y ago

I was born in Cincinnati, and lived there for 18 years until going to Ohio State. Today I live on the peninsula. I'm here in Cincinnati now, for family stuff. And I'm concerned. Cincinnati still has a large industrial component (P&G has their HQ here), but many factories are gone. A lot of the east side of the city has been converted into microbreweries, homes, and shopping. My Mom works at a biomedical company that's growing. Gigabit FTTH for residences is available. I'm still concerned. Property taxes have grown beyond reasonable limits. There are so many areas that are not benefiting from the improvements being made. There is culture being destroyed by rising rents and gentrification. And the pain killer/opioid epidemic gives a perfect path to "release". Case in point: Today I met some relatives at a brewery for lunch. But my Aunt had a problem ordering: They send a text message when your order is ready to pick up, and she doesn't have a mobile phone. The place was all stools and tables; if we had invited my grandfather, he wouldn't have had a place to sit. There are good places and people though. I'm here to attend my grandmothers funeral. In addition to my boss, two of my relatives also had flowers sent by their place of work. On the day we were doing planning, my uncle suddenly shows up: My uncle builds furniture; he was sent by his place of work to pick up some big sandwich & pasta platters, and drop it off to my grandfather. All paid for. I'm rambling. The point is: There is so much good here, and it is so at risk. And sometimes I think that if I moved back here (either working remotely, or finding a similar job locally), that I would just exacerbate the problem.

MarkPNeyer 9y ago
I Also grew up in cincinnati. You've probably seen signs with my last name (Neyer) on them, as my family has been there a while. Also live in the bay area now. Cincinnati really was like a small town; people did seem to look after each other. I think if people like us moved back there to work for other tech companies, we'd exacerbate the problem. If we moved back and started companies that employed low skilled labor, we'd make things better. If we could end the pointless war on drugs, and spend that same money repairing infrastructure, we'd be way better off. Our old system is breaking down. Unfortunately i think it'll have to get worse before it gets better.
cjy 9y ago
I live in Cincinnati. I don't think gentrification is responsible for the opioid epidemic. I would blame the increase in the supply of opioids and structural changes to the economy. Plenty of places without gentrification (rural Indiana) are being hit even harder. I'd also disagree that moving back would exacerbate the problem. A higher tax base would help the city to better combat the problem. You could also donate to non-profits or volunteer.

spraak 9y ago

I always wonder what would happen if caffeine/caffeine containing products (coffee, tea etc.) were illegal. Would people go to the same extremes for a caffeine fix?

spraak 9y ago
I'm curious why this would be down voted.
- SyneRyder 9y ago
  I gave you an upvote, as the question seems fair. But if you're a coffee/caffeine drinker, you can answer this for yourself by going without coffee for a couple of weeks. You'll miss it for a few days, but it's ultimately not something worth going to jail or having a hole drilled into your leg for.

mbgaxyz 9y ago

Moderators: This is a duplicate of an earlier post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15224794 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15224794 Which has the exact same URL: http://www.cincinnati.com/pages/interactives/seven-days-of-heroin-epidemic-cincinnati/ http://www.cincinnati.com/pages/interactives/seven-days-of-h... Is there a bug in the submission system?

chipperyman573 9y ago
If a page was recently submitted and didn't get many comments people can repost it.

eighthnate 9y ago

Is this journalism or just a publicity stunt for journalists? And why is everything a "battle", "war", etc. War against drugs. War against terror. Battle against heroin. And must everything be a "crisis". Maybe just knowing how the news industry works has me a bit cynical. Anyways there is always a "crisis". A few years ago, there was the meth crisis. A few years before that, the ecstasy crisis. Before that there was the crack crisis. Before that the marijuana crisis. All the way to opium. I guess as more things change, the more they stay the same.

julianz 9y ago

One thing not mentioned in the article is the size of the area and the population. I have no idea how big Cincinatti is or how many people live in those counties. So I don't know if those are big numbers or not.

prawn 9y ago
It's probably an oversight given they're writing first for a local audience?

nnfy 9y ago

For anyone who may be struggling with chronic pain and/or opioid addiction, I implore you to research kratom. As far as anyone can tell, it is safe, minimally addictive, and in my experience it is good for head pain, stomach pain, anxiety, minor depression, not to mention potentiation of all kinds of other drugs. Of course, use at your own risk. It may interact dangerously with many compounds, because it inhibits the cytochrome p450 enzyme. That said, after a six month up to three times a day habit, I've quit cold turkey twice without too much trouble. I recommend I highly if you're out of other options. One last warning, do not buy in person, you will be ripped off. You can get 250g for less than $30 online, and a dose for pain is 1-2 grams. Higher doses are mildly psychoactive, but OD is anecdotally impossible because you quickly become nauseaus and throw the powder up if you take in excess of 8-10+grams.

xrd 9y ago
I'm seeing lots of addicts wandering about Portland, OR. I read your comment with interest. I wonder if someone distributed this to addicts on the street if it would make a difference. I feel very helpless in reclaiming our city from an addiction crisis.
- nnfy 9y ago
  There are numerous anecdotal reports online of heroin users using kratom to kick the habit. At the very least, one can be functional on kratom, contribute to society, and withdrawal shouldn't be terrible enough to motivate violent crime.
tryckbarpingvin 9y ago
Kratom saved my wife's life. She has suffered chronic pain* for the past few years. Literally near suicide from it, but doctors wouldn't prescribe anything, because they couldn't find anything wrong. We are still looking into the reason she's in such pain, but at least she has something that allows her to live not confined to the bed all day put of agony. She's finally moving around again, doing the dishes, etc. *edit

xrd 9y ago

Does anyone know of anyone using the drugs listed here (ibogaine was one) to help addicts? Because of the FDA, is this something illegal? It would be fascinating if cryptocurrencies permitted a black market for drug trade that allowed concerned citizens to buy these drugs and distribute them to addicts without fear of interference by the federal government. A silk road that we could all stand behind.

xrd 9y ago
That would be an interesting YC non profit.
girvo 9y ago
Anecdotally, the three people I know/knew who used ibogaine to get "clean" failed to various degrees. It truly seemed to help each of them to begin with, but after about 6 months each one of them relapsed -- probably due to the lack of counselling and dealing with the original reasons they started using to begin with, I'd wager. Two of them are dead from overdoses, the other I'm unsure, I haven't seen or heard from him in years now.

rocketperson7 9y ago

as a Lyft driver in Cincinnati, this is really making me rethink my main source of income most of my passengers during the day are lower income, and while I personally haven't had any major issues there are definitely times when I'm glad certain passengers are out of my car. I feel like if the drug problem is really this bad, it's only a matter of time until one of these stories is in the back of my car

csense 9y ago

When I went to school they made sure that Drugs Are Bad, Just Say No was a message that was hammered into every single child. Think about how our culture views drug addicts -- if you hear an acquaintance or a friend of a friend is doing drugs, especially heroin, do you think "Man, that person's got it together! I really want to be like them!" No, you think about how they're a shitty person living a shitty life and you want to stay far, far away from them, because you know they'll lie and steal from you to get their fix. So I don't really have sympathy for addicts. It's not like drug addiction is a thing that happens to you, unlike losing your home to a hurricane, or getting cancer. If you choose to shove a needle of heroin in your arm of your own free will, that's a choice you've made -- and the consequences of that choice are also things that you've chosen for yourself. It's not like that people don't know that drugs ruin lives. It's not like it's a secret that drugs are illegal and you'll get sent to jail. The area I grew up in is a Rust Belt town in similar circumstances -- maybe with even more drugs and less hope than Cincinnati. So I share my understanding and dismay of the economic situation that community's in. But drugs aren't the answer, and anyone who turns to them is clearly lacking in moral character and common sense.

ZenoArrow 9y ago
> "It's not like drug addiction is a thing that happens to you" A common route that leads people to taking heroin is... 1. Go to the doctor, get prescribed pain medication. 2. Become addicted to pain medication during treatment. 3. After supply of pain medication dries up, turn to illegal alternatives (which includes heroin). So it really could happen to anyone, as it's possible to become an addict without any prior intention to take illegal substances.

leggomylibro 9y ago

>Heroin is big business, but not for the Mexican immigrant Reagan is tailing today. He’s just a suspected courier who might make $500 or so. The real money flows to the gangs that control distribution, and to the drug cartels back in Mexico. >When they finally pull him over, police rip up the floor boards and dig through the driver’s back pack. They check the bumpers and the trunk and look for secret compartments in the doors. >Nothing. >Reagan is frustrated. There have to be drugs in that car, he thinks. Wait, they pulled someone over and destroyed their car over nothing? I hope they had some really solid evidence, but the article didn't say. >The agents don’t have time to dwell on what went wrong. About 7,000 kilograms of heroin are seized in the United States every year, three times as much as a decade ago. They will be hunting someone new tomorrow. Oh, okay then. They don't have time to dwell on what went wrong.

BoiledCabbage 9y ago
> They don't have time to dwell on what went wrong. But damnmit the bigger issue and what I'm really mad at is people protesting Police abuse! /s It's absurd how skewed this country has become in the "Police can do no wrong" mentality. When spoken in the abstract people are quick to say of course there is corruption and things can be improved in policing. But when it comes to specifics or even specific instances popular opinion and the justice system never fails to side with the police. And no, it's not just the conflict of interest for prosecutors that's at issue. We have a serious issue with the role of Police as public servants in this country. The (deliberate) pendulum swing to overly idolizing soldiers post-Vietnam, the declaration that police were now in a war against an inanimate object (drugs) including equipment and tactics, and the "otherization" / racial aspect have really made a perfect storm that is has now begun to spread out to society at large.
- aklemm 9y ago
  It IS absurd and I'm with you in thinking it is a perfect storm. Possibly even a fundamental crisis of freedom. My latest tactic is to label these people "copsuckers". It makes me feel good anyway.

exikyut 9y ago

Wonder if anyone will see this, but I have a general question I might as well ask here. What if, you put an addicted person in a padded cell, and supply progressively decreasing doses of the drug(s) the person is addicted to? The dosage gradient could be mathematically computed to find the lowest possible harmful withdrawal effects. The person would stay in the cell environment until completely past the hardest phases of withdrawal (however long this takes, whether days, weeks, months(?)), but they would be free to move around (within the secure complex) as they please, and have limited access to technology (anything enabling communication would be heavily vetoed, but eg unlimited access to a video library could work well). It seems that the current models in use depend entirely on the will of a person who is heavily compromised. I honestly have to say, that seems fundamentally and ridiculously broken, and yeah, even suspiciously so: it's so obvious that this approach is not going to work for most, so why does every "treatment center" continue down this path? The only caveat I can think of with the suggestion above is about the violent phase of withdrawals, and sedating a person enough when in that phase so they can eat/drink/etc. (I'm not sure how long it is - I vaguely recall it's just a couple of days right?) Also, about the padded room - I'm not talking "psychotically mad-proof" padding, but just enough for this context. Obviously that's going to change per drug and person, and maybe thick padding is what would be required. I'm just thinking about cost here (cost of sedation and padding), because I know that a) everything health-related in the US seems to attract the most markup and overhead in any field in the world, and b) because (as per my notation that the current model is _suspiciously_ broken) I wouldn't be surprised if anyone who tried this would find it mysteriously hard to get funding. On the other hand, I must admit that I've never really tried to find out if this idea has been attempted or not. Would/does it not work?

girvo 9y ago
I am doing a version of this myself (minus the padded room), using buprenorphine under the supervision of an excellent case worker and doctor. It's taken 5 years, but I'm down to 1.6mg from 32mg at the start, and 24 works in the future I'll be off it entirely (and taking a month off to go down to my family's holiday home on the beach here in Australia, for the final withdrawal symptoms). One weird thing: even with my much lower dose, the acute withdrawals every morning are mostly the same. A little less bad, sure, but still rather terrible. I just put up with it, because it's better to be productive and able to move forward with my life after 6 years of heroin addiction than go back to where I was. Interestingly, opiate replacement therapy done with heroin itself has had quite good results. The downsides to buprenorphine and methadone is that the withdrawals are rather "drawn out" compared to heroin and morphine. The upside is that the fact they last so long in terms of binding is what makes them excellent at stopping a user from bouncing back and forward between the two (in theory anyway; a given users metabolism means this isn't always true. I could've easily used heroin any time during my treatment as I metabolise bupe and methadone extremely rapidly -- I just chose not to. It wasn't worth it.)

MaysonL 9y ago

And not one mention of doctors over-prescribing opioids!

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