For those who suspect that the medical profession may bear some responsibility for the opioid epidemic, I present a prescription written for Elvis Presley, August 1977. Like many middle age folks, he suffered from back pain and stress. And like most folks, he trusted the medical professionals to “do no harm” prescribing nothing with serious side effects. Clearly he was wrong.
Elis prescription, August 1977. Opioid city.
The above prescription is a disaster, but you may think this is just an aberration. A crank doctor who hooked (literally) a celebrity patient, but not as aberrant as one might think. I worked for a pharmacist in the 1970s, and the vast majority of prescriptions we saw were for these sort of mood altering drugs. The pharmacist I worked for refused to service many of these customers, and even phoned the doctor to yell at him for one particular egregious case: a shivering skinny kid with a prescription for diet pills, but my employer was the aberration. All those prescriptions would be filled by someone, and a great number of people walked about in a haze because of it.
The popular Stones song, Mother’s Little Helper, would not have been so popular if it were not true to life. One might ask why it was true to life, as doctors might have prescribed less addicting drugs. I believe the reason is that doctors listened to advertising then, and now. They might have suggested marijuana for pain or depression — there was good evidence it worked — but there were no colorful brochures with smiling actors. The only positive advertising was for opioids, speed, and Valium and that was what was prescribed then and still today.
One of the most common drugs prescribed to kids these days is speed, marketed as “Ritalin.” It prevents daydreaming and motor-mouth behaviors; see my essay is ADHD a real disease?. I’m not saying that ADD kids aren’t annoying, or that folks don’t have back ached, but the current drugs are worse than marijuana as best I can tell. It would be nice to get non-high-inducing pot extract sold in pharmacies, in my opinion, and not in specialty stores (I trust pharmacists). AS things now stand the users have medical prescription cards, but the black sellers end up in jail..
Robert Buxbaum, January 25, 2018. Please excuse the rant. I ran for sewer commissioner, 2016, And as a side issue, I’d like to reduce the harsh “minimum” penalties for crimes of possession with intent to sell, while opening up sale to normal, druggist channels.
“…but my employer was the aberration.”
“(I trust pharmacists)”
But trust them to do what, literally get people hooked on drugs?
As an aside, I have literally never in my life been spoken to by a pharmacist about anything other than what my bill is, yet the vast, vast, vast majority of budtenders talk to patients about their conditions and make good-faith recommendations of various products and strains tailored to their needs. While the budtenders’ knowledge pretty much consists of old wives’ tales and urban myths, at least they’re doing the best with what they have, which I would never say about a pharmacist.
Pharmacists talk to and care less about their customers than illegal drug dealers, and I don’t think anyone with experience going to both would disagree.
When next we meet, remind me to tell you about the time I shared a cab with the pathologist who followed up on the messed up first autopsy.