I’m a physician, the biggest culprit in the opioid crisis is the government. They are the ones that started telling doctors that “pain is the fifth vital sign”.

I’m a physician, the biggest culprit in the opioid crisis is the government. They are the ones that started telling doctors that “pain is the fifth vital sign”. They are the ones that said they would pay doctors based on results of patient surveys - it turns out that addicts wanting opiates from doctors give you bad scores if you don’t give them what they want. And that has nothing to do with capitalism - more the opposite, it shows how good intentions together with the overwhelming force of the government can ruin people’s lives. So maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to encourage the use of government power in those cases where we agree with the political party using that power? To everyone in this thread who has this overwhelming righteousness indignation about mckinsey - have any of you ever asked your elected representative about their view of the government’s responsibility for the opiate crisis? Would you ever vote differently based on the answers they give? Did any of the state attorney generals who are going after private companies ever do anything to stop the (federal) government encouraging the increased use of pain medication? This is a classic example of unintended consequences by the government - the companies were just responding to the incentives the government created.