There shouldn’t be any controversy regarding these programs because there is no evidence that anyone will suddenly experiment with heroin because free needles are available. These programs are for people with serious drug addictions. Various organizations, including the GAO, CDC, and World Health Organization, have universally recognized the effectiveness of needle exchange programs. For example, needle exchange programs reduce HIV rates by 80% among intravenous drug users, according to the Center for Disease Control. In addition, the savings in health care costs are astounding and more than pay for the cost of these programs. According to the Harm Reduction Coalition, every $385,200 that is spent on needle exchange programs can prevent 30 HIV infections. The same amount of money represents the lifetime cost of medical care for each new person infected with HIV.
Joe Biden railed against some common sense harm reduction efforts during his time in the Senate. His indirect target was the fairly benign drug MDMA or ecstasy, which had been legal until 1985. In fact, it was frequently prescribed beforehand by therapists, particularly marriage counselors. Furthermore, the overdose risk from the drug ecstasy is fairly low, as long as the proper harm reduction methods are in place. Ecstasy is generally the drug of choice at electronic musical festivals known as raves. Accordingly, some non-profit groups attend these festivals to test the purity of partygoers’ pills. On the other hand, the most valid risk for ecstasy users is overheating. That’s why raves used to have plenty of bottled water available and “chill rooms,” but now business owners who offer those things are at risk for violating the law.
Those kinds of harm reduction effo...
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...tion, Dr. Ben Sessa, a psychiatrist and addiction specialist, suggested to the BBC that the reason behind the lack of research may be because ibogaine can’t be patented; after all, it comes from a plant.
Many Americans still oppose methadone treatments even though there is a strong net positive impact. There is a cost-savings in comparison to incarceration and a reduction in crime and STDs associated with intravenous drug use. Methadone is horribly unhealthy, but it serves as a safer substitute to help the addict withdraw from opiates. Also, methadone has a longer lasting effect which allows patients to take only one dose a day (around $15 a day) without feeling intoxicated if the dosage is prescribed reasonably. For those reasons, methadone users can generally maintain a more productive work life than heroin addicts who feel the need to use multiple times a day.
On the typical day, over 90 people will die at the hand of opioid abuse in America alone (National). In fact, as of 2014, nearly 2 million Americans were dependent and abusing opioids. The Opioid Crisis has affected America and its citizens in various ways, including health policy, health care, and the life in populous areas. Due to the mass dependence and mortality, the crisis has become an issue that must be resolved in all aspects.
By providing clean needles to drug addicts, are we causing another issue such as increased drug
The methadone program at Rosthern Hospital is a very active and intense program. Boast over 20 patients that are regular methadone users, the involvement of the physicians, pharmacists, nurses, and addiction counselors are key (Melle, 2016). Dr. Melle is the coordinator of the methadone program at Rosthern Hospital. His roles include, patient recruitment, patient care management, follow up care, and most importantly prescription and dosage of the methadone (Melle, 2016). Pharmacist’s role in methadone treatment is providing the methadone to the hospital, as well as in Warman pharmacy they monitor and dispense some methadone to some of the patients in the methadone program. Addiction counselors are an outside resource that the staff at Rosthern hospital can utilize. There are not social workers or counselors at Rosthern, but Dr. Melle and the nurses prefer if their patients are regularly seeing an addiction counselor while in the methadone program. Finally, the nurses role in the methadone program is early treatment and monitoring of patients during detox, the continued monitoring or patients when methadone doses change, dispensing methadone and monitoring our patients in the recovery program, and observation of patient’s success during the program. Together the interprofessional team has successfully treated dozens of patients, and the methadone program address the needs of both the patients and the addiction issues that are plaguing the surrounding communities (Melle,
The documentary states that over 27,000 deaths a year are due to overdose from heroin and other opioids. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2015 prescription pain relievers account for 20,101 overdose deaths, and 12,990 overdose deaths are related to heroin (Rudd et al., 2010-2015). The documentary’s investigation gives the history of how the heroin epidemic started, with a great focus on the hospice movement. We are presented with the idea that once someone is addicted to painkillers, the difficulty in obtaining the drug over a long period of time becomes too expensive and too difficult. This often leads people to use heroin. This idea is true as a 2014 survey found that 94% of respondents who were being treated for opioid addiction said they chose to use heroin because prescription opioids were “more expensive and harder to obtain (Cicero et al., 2014).” Four in five heroin users actually started out using prescription painkillers (Johns, 2013). This correlation between heroin and prescription painkiller use supports the idea presented in the documentary that “prescription opiates are heroin prep school.”
After considering both parts of the issues I am all for methadone treatment and am about 50% on board for the needle exchange. For example, the needle exchange benefits people who get pierced benefit because the piercers must also use sterile needles even if this is not for drug use. But, at the same time needle exchange doesn’t necessarily reduce the spread of HIV and in the long run I don’t think that it’s worth it to showcase needle exchange as the top preventer of the transmittance of HIV. I am all for methadone treatment because of the fact that opiates are extremely hard to get off and at least this way it is proven that the addicts can at least try to assimilate themselves back into normal living if that is their wish.
Tanner, G., Bordon, N., Conroy, S., & Best, D. (2011). Comparing methadone and suboxone in
Ecstasy is mostly one of the drugs that they want to push the legalization use of it. Many people outside of raves think it would still be a horrible idea to include ecstasy at raves due to the effects of what the drug does. People who attend raves said that they should wear bracelets and sell the drug to people over the age of 21. The problem with that is many people have health issues and they just ignore the fact that the drug can cause serious injuries or damage the brain. Ecstasy has a lesser rate of death and overdose issues, but probably would not happen. If it were to happen they should the limit or the usage of the drug so people would not over dose or cause a lot of health issues. Raves should allow a health of the people who is going when they purchase the tickets and should be prepared of what they are doing and what is going to happen. (“Drug
Many people believe that the only way to receive HIV and AIDS is through sexual intercourse. Although it can be spread through sexual intercourse without proper protection, there is a bigger issue at hand. Not only can HIV and AIDS be transferred through sex, it can be transferred through the sharing of needles. A large number of people forget that drugs are becoming a popular trend in today’s society. The spread of HIV and AIDS has increased because of the sharing of needles between drug users.Not only is it an STD (Sexually Transmitted Disease) it is a bloodborne pathogen. This is why needle exchange programs are a must have in communities like Licking County, today. Needle exchange programs are extremely helpful because it decreases the spread of HIV and AIDS.
Although needle exchange programs have been successful, they have had some criticism. One of the main goals in the needle exchange program is to prevent or to reduce the rate of transmission of any infectious diseases, such as the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) or hepatitis C by distributing sterile syringes. The intended group that this program is trying to focus on is injecting drug users, since they have a high rate of either repeatedly using a contaminated syringe or sharing the same syringe with others. These programs do not only focus on distributing syringes to those who choose to accept them, some of the programs provide different services such as, counseling groups, education classes about the risk of using contaminated syringes, free medical visits, and HIV testing. On the other hand, some people may be against these types of programs because they are allowing injection drug users to continue to use drugs. Another reason why people may not be as accepting of the needle exchange programs is due to the fact that these programs are government funded.
Credibility material: Its intake results in adverse medical conditions that are further exalted by its addiction properties that ensure a continued intake of the substance. The drug can be abused through multiple means and is medically recorded to produce short-term joy, energy , and other effects such as increased heart rate and blood pressure. This ultimately results in numerous psychiatric and social problems; factors that played a major role in its illegalization after multiple and widespread cases of its effects were reported in the country during the 1900s. In addition to this, the drug results in immediate euphoric effect, a property which the National Institute of Drug Abuse (2010) attributes to be the root cause for its increased po...
In the United States, opioid addiction rates have majorly increased . Between 2000-2015 more than half a million individuals have died from Opioid overdose, and nearly 5 million people have an opioid dependence which has become a serious problem. The Center for Disease control reports that there are 91 deaths daily due to opioid abuse. Taking opioids for long periods of time and in
This leads to the second school of thought on medically assisted treatment. There has been a great deal of debate about the medication used to treat Opiate addiction, methadone. Many feel that the drug methadone is simply trading one drug in for another, as the addiction to methadone is quick and almost more powerful than an opiate addiction (Nelson, 1994). The withdrawals effects are far more intense with methadone and for this reason it is a lifetime maintenance medication. Some suggest that more rehabilitative programs are needed that would address the social problems the users have to help them recover, instead of the methadone program that is viewed...
Sisario, Ben and James C. McKinley. “Drugs Deaths Threaten Rising Business of Electronic Music Fests”. New York Times. 9 Sept 2013. Web. 1 Apr 2014.
Recreational drug use has been controversial for years. Government has deemed the use of certain drugs to be dangerous, addictive, costly, and fatal. Governmental agencies have passed laws to make drugs illegal and then have focused a great deal of attention and money trying to prohibit the use of these drugs, and many people support these sanctions because they view the illegality of drugs to be the main protection against the destruction of our society (Trebach, n.d.). Restricting behavior doesn’t generally stop people from engaging in that behavior; prohibition tends to result in people finding more creative ways to obtain and use drugs. However, just knowing that trying to control people’s behavior by criminalizing drug use does not work still leaves us looking for a solution, so what other options exist? This paper will discuss the pros and cons about one option: decriminalizing drugs.
Ecstasy Effects | Information on Ecstasy,Club. Drugs,Pills and MDMA. Web. The Web. The Web.