Such bullshit. Apparently they're even selling special fentanyl surgical gloves that claim to protect you from getting poisoned from touching fent. Just absolute bullshit.
Inflation is so bad that they're using dollar bills to package drugs. Great idea btw
Propaganda surrounding fentanyl is how they're getting people to accept the drug war again. The more people think of it as a toxic bio-weapon, the more likely people will accept laws making possession of any amount of the substance grounds for terrorism charges, even if possessed unknowingly in laced drugs.
The presence of fentanyl in US recreational drug supplies is a policy choice. That's all there is to it. It would not exist in these quantities if prohibition were to end. I'm hoping eventually most people will realize this as they notice the contradiction that they are becoming less and less likely to receive safe and effective pain relief from doctors due to tightening of prescriptions, but they're easily able to receive unsafe pain relief from local drug dealers if they're willing to risk prison.
Yea isnt it getting cut into heroin or cocaine to try and skim the product but have more profits?
less likely to receive safe and effective pain relief from doctors due to tightening of prescriptions
The opioid crisis was caused by doctors giving them out like candy and people having to go to dealers for the shit to hit the same. I guess you are right that this crisis was entirely created by the pharmaceutical companies which lumpens came in and seized on the opportunity.
Yeah, originally doctors who didn't know any better accepted pharmaceutical company propaganda at face value and started over prescribing. Then when people became wise to this, the DEA and politicians took it as an opportunity to rapidly expand the war on drugs, suddenly cutting off people's prescriptions without a care for how this might impact anyone used to the high prescription rate and putting people into prison when they tried to get relief elsewhere. In fact, I'd say now there is a problem with under-prescribing. Many people who are actually in pain can no longer get pain relief. And those that can often have to give up things like marijuana to stay on the program.
The lack of pharmaceutical grade drugs then made it very easy for fentanyl to enter the drug supply without the existence of safe and cheap alternatives, causing the rapidly exploding overdose rate we see now. It's so pervasive that many opioid addicts take fake pills pressed with fentanyl knowingly because its literally the only thing around. That goes double for "Heroin" that is now mostly inert powders, veterinary tranquilizers, benzodiazepines, and fentanyl.
But even before the over-prescribing really became a problem there was always a background opioid epidemic. It turns out that when capitalism makes life suck people will seek out an alternative and others will provide that alternative so they can get ahead. It was true then that ending prohibition and providing people with safe, regulated drugs was the only solution that would saves lives and it's even truer now.
It was true then that ending prohibition and providing people with safe, regulated drugs was the only solution that would saves lives and it’s even truer now
How is this the solution? How is continuing the dependence people have on these drugs the path forward? The communist position is the complete abolition of 'drugs' since it itself is a social category. You can look at China as the prime example, a nation that was addicted to opium had abolished it during the Mao period. The irony is that these types of drugs are obviously not 'safe' since it led to this current crisis in the first place!
There is an existing population that is addicted to opioids, and from what (admittedly little) research I've done into the topic, it seems like some of the most successful ways of getting people off of their addictions is providing a space where they can get easy access to free, safe drugs that also has optional treatment centers for those who want to get clean. If they feel forced, they just won't go at all.
Advocating for tighter control on illegal drugs will, in the US at least, just result in more money going to cops so they can brutalize minorities. I don't think banning recreational drug use would be remotely viable until the very highest stages of communism. For your China example, they have banned many "hard" drugs due to the obvious suffering they caused due to the will of the colonial powers, but they still allow other recreational drugs like alcohol and cigarettes.
China has the history of the opium wars looming over its drug policy. I'm not going to presume what's best for them because I have never lived there.
I do know that in the imperial core the criminalization and prohibition of drugs are used to oppress and enslave racial minorities. There is no justice for any of that while these racist drug laws remain in effect.
Then there's the harm reduction aspect. The prohibition of hard drugs has created an entirely unregulated drug black market where drug users have little to no recourse if their dealer poisons them. This black market remains as a consequence of prohibition in the imperial core so long as we exist under capitalism. That would remain the case even while we exist under socialism during a transition to a communist society. Drugs, especially opioids, are made wildly more dangerous under current conditions. Legalization with tough regulation is the only path forward.
That said, no one should be allowed to profit off of addictive drugs, they should be provided to people for free if they can demonstrate a history of prior use. This is vastly preferable to people getting desperate enough to consider injecting bathtub krokodil or using heavily stepped on mystery powder Heroin.
I remember back before the opioid epidemic in the 90s or 00s they'd make up just insane claims about PCP. Stuff like "We shot the guy fifty times but he still kept coming!" and "He had the strength of ten men". Looking back I'm realizing that they just mythologize drugs so they can justify brutalizing people.
if pcp did that they would 100% be pumping it into their soldiers lmao
This is just to make people think that cops don’t steal money from crime scenes
i want to tell a room full of pigs that half of them have fentanyl poisoning and film the ensuing paranoid melee.
I heard if you jerk off with the glove on it’s like getting a handjob from a different person.
Im still fairly convinced the feds are cutting this shit in to everything at a higher level so they can easily pin dealers down the line and fuel propaganda for increased drug war funding. I dont buy the "dealers do it to make their product more desirable" bit people keep parroting.
often when it gets into unrelated substances it's more cross contamination then deliberate cutting. fent in meth would be a waste of money and produce a weird high that nobody looking to tweak would want. what's likely is some middle man had both in the same room and used the same blender or container without removing the fentanyl and some dusting coated a few bags in a clinically significant dose.
