🚀 go-pugleaf

Daniel J. Hertzman <NOdhertzSPAM@total.net> wrote in message
news:fugs6.28988$ZT5.737137@news.total.net...
>
> > [snipped to one item for a personal rant]
> >
> >
> > BTW, I heard the other day that legal prescription drugs kill 10 times
> more
> > people every year than illegal street drugs. 10 frickin' times. Ain't
that
> > charming?
> >
> Hmmm, where did you get that stat...

Paul Kennedy's program, "Ideas" on CBC radio. Unfortunately this episode is
not yet detailed on their web site, so I can't even swear to the item title.
It aired this week.

> I would be curious as to how people use
> prescription drugs vs. illegal drugs, and how much of each, I would hazard
a
> guess that at least 10 times more prescription drugs are used that illegal
> street drugs.

Indeed I would expect it would be much higher yet.

> Also I would be curious how they defined death by
> prescription drugs. E.g.,  If a patient w/ cardiac disease is given a
blood
> thinner that isn't strong enough, and the patient dies did s/he die
because
> of the prescption drug?

Can't swear to this. However, the points being made at the time revolved
around issues such as (a) drugs that killed thousands of people outright
because testing was in some way inadequate, e.g. it hadn't revealed side
effects in certain segments of the population, or interactions with other
drugs, (b) misdiagnosis, (c) mistakes made in prescribing (e.g. a decimal
point in the wrong place, illegible prescriptions) and such. The theme that
emerged from the program was that people need to be a lot more
discriminating when accepting prescriptions, and ask a lot of questions to
get at information that often isn't volunteered or perhaps even known by the
prescribing physician. Caveat emptor, basically.

> > Sounds to me like the "war on drugs" would be a lot more beneficial if
it
> > was aimed at reckless pharmaceutical companies and physicians instead of
> pot
> > farmers.
>
> I happen to opposed to the war on drugs myself, but I suspect taht it
would
> be equally fruitless sent against the targets you suggest.

I certainly can't disagree with that, sadly.

> And 'mericans wouldn't even have to travel outside their borders to
> > wage war. But what fun would that be? Bwwwaaa haaa... yeah, I'm dreamin'
> of
> > course. There's waaaay too much money in the legal drug trade, so
> hipocracy
> > reigns. Keep on rockin' in the free world.
> >
> > Anyone besides me suspect that Aspirin would be illegal if it grew on a
> > house plant? (I guess I'd better not mention anything about wolf
willow.)
>
> No, it wouldn't be illegal in that case, though Aspirin would be illegal
if
> it grew in a houseplant AND gave you a high, but anything that gives you a
> high would be illegal (the exception being alcohol and cigarettes of
course
> which have the luxury of what is basically a grandfather clause). I'm not
> saying its a good way to determine the illegality of a substance, but it
is
> the one we presently use in our country.

Why do you suppose that is? (That isn't a challenge; I'm genuinely curious.)
Is it solely Christian morality, or, as some suggest, protection of
commercial interests, or neither or both? (Didn't really mean to turn that
into a multiple choice question...)

And why is it that the lessons of prohibition seem never to have been
learned?

> >
> > OK, I'm gettin' carried away. This Fair Trade coffee really packs a
> > wallop...
> >
>
> Speaking of which, by the unnatural high standard, coffee also would
> probably be illegal because of the caffeine.

No doubt. And soft drinks, chocolate bars, etc. etc. ad nauseum.  If you
choose to "protect" people from something through legislation, where do you
draw the line? I'd wager that fast food and inactivity causes many more
physical and emotional health problems, lost productivity etc. than do
illegal substances. Do we outlaw fast food and legislate exercise programs?

This brings us back to the original thrust of this thread, with which I
strongly agree: I don't think the government should be in the business of
trying to protect us from ourselves. That's something we need to take
personal responsibility for.

Cheers,
-smw