4 ms·

What price is a human life worth if $50 multiple times is "kinda crazy?"

cobbzilla 7y ago
Oh it’s totally worth it, and said as much. I meant it’s crazy (hard) to imagine oneself needing a life-saver on a regular basis.
- mikeash 7y ago
  Everybody needs regular food to avoid dying. Many need insulin or heart medication. Many need regular pills to keep their brains from going off the rails. Is this so different?
  - cobbzilla 7y ago
    Most people don’t have their groceries delivered via ambulance, and risk dying if their food doesn’t arrive soon enough. If you did that, then yeah I’d say that’s kinda crazy too.
  - michaelt 7y ago
    Some would see narcan as more like deploying car airbags - good that it's kept you alive, but if you need them routinely you should probably think twice before getting behind the wheel.
    - mikeash 7y ago
      And if you need pills routinely you should probably think twice before having a chronic condition.
      - cf498 7y ago
        Overdosing isnt an unfortunate sideffect, its people making an error while dosing. An error that is easily preventable with a bit of care. The airback equivalent is very much fitting, its an emergency aid for once you made a mistake. If you are overdosing regularly, you are majorly screwing up making unnecessary mistakes.
        CydeWeys 7y ago
        I doubt it's easily preventable, or there wouldn't be so much of it. My understanding is that drugs are cut to varying strengths, and sometimes are laced with stuff like fentanyl or other compounds that you weren't expecting and that are highly active at lower doses. Preventing ODs is easy if you have a pure product of an exact known strength and an accurate scale, but these conditions aren't often true in the real world.
        cf498 7y ago
        Its largely preventable if you act with a reasonable level of care. Test the water with a new batch before you use it, even if its just administering a fraction of what you cooked up first. You are unlikely to have such potent stuff that a hundredth of an active dose is giving you an OD. That is unless someone is actively trying to kill you. The equivalent of an allergy test is nothing specific to injecting hard drugs. Addicts often dont do it since the test dosage is wasted and its extra injection. It becomes especially problematic when money is tight and you buy individual bubbles. But that is the inherent risk you take with street drugs and the care and effort you have to invest to not OD. Its like never sharing anything that goes into your veins. Neither an OD nor catching HIV or Hep-C are cases of just bad luck, they are the result of being reckless and skipping an important and necessary step.
        CydeWeys 7y ago
        Given the psychology of addiction, is it reasonable to expect an addict who's seriously jonesing for a hit to be this cautious and delay the satisfaction of getting high?
        cf498 7y ago
        I dont see how there is a difference to not sharing needles. The addiction argument is the same there and even people at the end of their line managed to follow that rule during the periods in history where the war on drugs included syringes as drug paraphernalia. Its simply not an option to break that rule. No ifs or buts.
rootusrootus 7y ago
Well, if you're spending $50 over and over to save the life of someone who then immediately gets back up and goes off to find more heroin, then "what price is a human life worth" is an interesting question indeed. There are billions of us, and some cost a lot more than they contribute.
- mikeash 7y ago
  While this is true, trying to figure out ahead of time if they’ll cost more than they contribute is the path to madness. (And even trying to figure it out after the fact is pretty ridiculous for the vast majority.) A person who eats poorly and doesn’t exercise can easily rack up millions of dollars in treatments for heart attacks and strokes. Yet they don’t seem to get anything like the same derision. Why?
  - ThrowawayR2 7y ago
    > While this is true, trying to figure out ahead of time if they’ll cost more than they contribute is the path to madness. I'll point out that people rescued from the brink of death are usually grateful for it, whereas these poor individuals, as noted in the article, often take a swing at their rescuers. I think that pretty much answers the question of whether they cost more than they contribute. > A person who eats poorly and doesn’t exercise can easily rack up millions of dollars in treatments for heart attacks and strokes. Yet they don’t seem to get anything like the same derision. Why? What makes you think people don't? Have you never observed someone or even yourself doing something unhealthy and thought glumly "Yep, eating/drinking this is going to put him/her/me one step closer to death by a lifestyle disease. Foolish of him/her/me."
    - mikeash 7y ago
      How does them taking a swing at their rescuers tell us anything about their relative costs and benefits to society? What makes me think people don’t? The fact that you begrudge $50 to save an addict’s life, while your theoretical reaction to someone eating themselves to death is “foolish of him” seems to back that up pretty strongly.

Oh it’s totally worth it, and said as much. I meant it’s crazy (hard) to imagine oneself needing a life-saver on a regular basis.

mikeash 7y ago
Everybody needs regular food to avoid dying. Many need insulin or heart medication. Many need regular pills to keep their brains from going off the rails. Is this so different?
- cobbzilla 7y ago
  Most people don’t have their groceries delivered via ambulance, and risk dying if their food doesn’t arrive soon enough. If you did that, then yeah I’d say that’s kinda crazy too.
- michaelt 7y ago
  Some would see narcan as more like deploying car airbags - good that it's kept you alive, but if you need them routinely you should probably think twice before getting behind the wheel.
  - mikeash 7y ago
    And if you need pills routinely you should probably think twice before having a chronic condition.
    - cf498 7y ago
      Overdosing isnt an unfortunate sideffect, its people making an error while dosing. An error that is easily preventable with a bit of care. The airback equivalent is very much fitting, its an emergency aid for once you made a mistake. If you are overdosing regularly, you are majorly screwing up making unnecessary mistakes.
      - CydeWeys 7y ago
        I doubt it's easily preventable, or there wouldn't be so much of it. My understanding is that drugs are cut to varying strengths, and sometimes are laced with stuff like fentanyl or other compounds that you weren't expecting and that are highly active at lower doses. Preventing ODs is easy if you have a pure product of an exact known strength and an accurate scale, but these conditions aren't often true in the real world.
        cf498 7y ago
        Its largely preventable if you act with a reasonable level of care. Test the water with a new batch before you use it, even if its just administering a fraction of what you cooked up first. You are unlikely to have such potent stuff that a hundredth of an active dose is giving you an OD. That is unless someone is actively trying to kill you. The equivalent of an allergy test is nothing specific to injecting hard drugs. Addicts often dont do it since the test dosage is wasted and its extra injection. It becomes especially problematic when money is tight and you buy individual bubbles. But that is the inherent risk you take with street drugs and the care and effort you have to invest to not OD. Its like never sharing anything that goes into your veins. Neither an OD nor catching HIV or Hep-C are cases of just bad luck, they are the result of being reckless and skipping an important and necessary step.
        CydeWeys 7y ago
        Given the psychology of addiction, is it reasonable to expect an addict who's seriously jonesing for a hit to be this cautious and delay the satisfaction of getting high?
        cf498 7y ago
        I dont see how there is a difference to not sharing needles. The addiction argument is the same there and even people at the end of their line managed to follow that rule during the periods in history where the war on drugs included syringes as drug paraphernalia. Its simply not an option to break that rule. No ifs or buts.

rootusrootus 7y ago

Well, if you're spending $50 over and over to save the life of someone who then immediately gets back up and goes off to find more heroin, then "what price is a human life worth" is an interesting question indeed. There are billions of us, and some cost a lot more than they contribute.

mikeash 7y ago
While this is true, trying to figure out ahead of time if they’ll cost more than they contribute is the path to madness. (And even trying to figure it out after the fact is pretty ridiculous for the vast majority.) A person who eats poorly and doesn’t exercise can easily rack up millions of dollars in treatments for heart attacks and strokes. Yet they don’t seem to get anything like the same derision. Why?
- ThrowawayR2 7y ago
  > While this is true, trying to figure out ahead of time if they’ll cost more than they contribute is the path to madness. I'll point out that people rescued from the brink of death are usually grateful for it, whereas these poor individuals, as noted in the article, often take a swing at their rescuers. I think that pretty much answers the question of whether they cost more than they contribute. > A person who eats poorly and doesn’t exercise can easily rack up millions of dollars in treatments for heart attacks and strokes. Yet they don’t seem to get anything like the same derision. Why? What makes you think people don't? Have you never observed someone or even yourself doing something unhealthy and thought glumly "Yep, eating/drinking this is going to put him/her/me one step closer to death by a lifestyle disease. Foolish of him/her/me."
  - mikeash 7y ago
    How does them taking a swing at their rescuers tell us anything about their relative costs and benefits to society? What makes me think people don’t? The fact that you begrudge $50 to save an addict’s life, while your theoretical reaction to someone eating themselves to death is “foolish of him” seems to back that up pretty strongly.