General / Off-Topic CDC Report: life expectancy falling

[Robin of Spiritwood]

There's an ongoing problem with opioids across the world, but the US seems to be especially hard hit. From thie latest CDC report:

As the US grapples with an opioid crisis, overdoses claim more and more lives, the CDC report found. The age-adjusted death rate has gone up 16% per year since 2014.

Drug overdose deaths accounted for 70,237 deaths last year - nearly 10% higher than in 2016 - with a significantly higher rate of death among men, compared to women.

The death rate from overdoses caused by synthetic opioids like fentanyl increased by 45% in one year.

Part of the problem is the chemistry.
Fentanyl binds to opioid receptors 100 times better than heroin, or it's morphine metabolite. A tiny
miscalculation of the dose size can take out an adult. Fentanyl is absorbed through the skin, and if you just dust off a powdery surface with a hand it can lead to unconsciousness and cardiorepiratory arrest.

We use Fentanyl all the time at work. It's effective and safe if carefully used with electronic monitoring in an ICU or an operating theatre. But NOT as a home or street drug.

There's a modified version called Carfentanyl.

Carfentanyl just got approved by the FDA, and it is 100 times more potent than Fentanyl itself. It's too dangerous in pure form, and has to be used in solution. Is this really a good idea, given the
data? The margin for error was razor thin before.

Arguably the most at-risk population for suicides is the younger veterans. Carfentanyl was approved specifically for use on battlefields. So every US soldier is going to learn about it. it's an obvious
giant time bomb. Maybe they should have called it Hearsefentanyl.

 

[MottiKhan]

I didn't know about fentanyl until it made the news recently. Right after that, they had my wife on it after spine surgery. I was concerned after the scare tactics in the news.

But the medical folks know what they're doing and I can trust their judgement. My wife came through it fine and is recovering well.

The most powerful thing I've ever been on was duiloted (sp?). When they put it into my IV it felt just wrong. It took the pain away, but the feeling was awful. I think I'd hate fentanyl.

 

[metatheurgist]

Don't want to sound harsh but having more people bite it is actually good for the world considering much of the population doesn't care at all (or even believe) in solving it's problems.

 

[Robin of Spiritwood]

duiloted (sp?)

Maybe Dilaudid?
Hydromorphone IIRC.

That's 10 times the potency of morphine, so they'd use 1 mg instead of 10. It's still in the range of safety, as it's not absorbable through the skin in minuscule amounts. We don't have that one here, but the side effects would probably be similar to regular morphine?

There's one clear advantage: getting rid of it.
The more potent it is, the lower the dose needed, and the faster our bodies can metabolize it away. So more potent ones are useful in people who have kidney or liver impairment. But again, that implies it's most useful in a hospital type of place.

 

[Jacques d'Orleans]

Arguably the most at-risk population for suicides is the younger veterans. Carfentanyl was approved specifically for use on battlefields. So every US soldier is going to learn about it. it's an obvious
giant time bomb. Maybe they should have called it Hearsefentanyl.

Was it approved as a medication or as chemical weapon? I'm asking because Carfentanyl is used as an incapacitating agent by the Russian Special Forces.

 

[Patrick_68000]

I become more and more insensitive to the problems of the "humanity".

Man destroys the planet ? The planet and the universe helps man to destroy himself.

It's only justice.

 

[Shadowdancer]

Less people is mo' better. A general global decrease of life expectancy would be better than a select group effectively suiciding by sheer ignorance though.

 

[Dural]

Less people is mo' better. A general global decrease of life expectancy would be better than a select group effectively suiciding by sheer ignorance though.

Yes but allowing them to become addicted to opiates which when their prescriptions run out, causes them to start buying street drugs which are laced with fentanyl which causes death might not be an ideal way of doing it though.

I appreciate people deserve the most effective and safest method of pain killing medication but prescribing opiates on an industrial scale might not be that safe long term. Some people get addicted to things, that's just how they are, some of those people will not be able to break the addiction and if they are then forced to feed the demon with lethal substances, they die. Maybe there are worse ways to die but one way of looking at this problem is enabling people who are especially susceptible to become addicted to prescription opiates is criminally irresponsible. I'm sure there are plenty of arguments from all sorts of perspectives.

 

[Chris Simon]

I become more and more insensitive to the problems of the "humanity".

Man destroys the planet ? The planet and the universe helps man to destroy himself.

It's only justice.

To paraphrase Jim Jeffries:

"We live with a false idea that we have to save the planet.
No. We have to save ourselves. The planet doesn't give a damn about us and it will be happy when we're gone. It will go: "Hell, I'm gonna do dinosaurs, again."

 

[Robin of Spiritwood]

Was it approved as a medication or as chemical weapon? I'm asking because Carfentanyl is used as an incapacitating agent by the Russian Special Forces.

Interesting info.
The FDA has approved it for medical use: pain relief. But it obviously works as an aerosol - the dose and exposure time cannot be controlled, so that would be a bad "incapacitator". It's a lethal agent. Probably more humane than Novichok or Polonium.

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

Personally I'm not too fussed if drug addicts basically commit suicide from their habit.
Solution is don't do drugs, duh!

However, if regular medicine from surgery or whatever is leading to drug addiction, then that needs to be addressed.

 

[Gortron]

I can't see this thread lasting for long due to the subject; it joins two banned topics!

The war on drugs has already been lost and is utterly stupid. It is like a war on supply and demand were the tactic to stop demand is to remove supply.

Look at what has happened with 'Legal Highs' (in the UK). People dodged the laws to make chemicals that weren't banned that are far more damaging than the ones that were illegal in the first place. Our governments (all of them) sack scientific advisors when they don't tell them what they want them to say.

Much of this stuff is common sense; More people die from Horse riding than taking MDMA. Uniquely our government sacks Scientific advisors that make that obvious.

 

[Gortron]

Personally I'm not too fussed if drug addicts basically commit suicide from their habit.
Solution is don't do drugs, duh!

However, if regular medicine from surgery or whatever is leading to drug addiction, then that needs to be addressed.

Have you watched Trainspotting?

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

Have you watched Trainspotting?

Nah, tried. Got bored.
Wasn't about trains... Lol

 

[Patrick_68000]

To paraphrase Jim Jeffries:

"We live with a false idea that we have to save the planet.
No. We have to save ourselves. The planet doesn't give a damn about us and it will be happy when we're gone. It will go: "Hell, I'm gonna do dinosaurs, again."

So true.

 

[Gully Foyle]

There's an ongoing problem with opioids across the world, but the US seems to be especially hard hit. From thie latest CDC report:



Part of the problem is the chemistry.
Fentanyl binds to opioid receptors 100 times better than heroin, or it's morphine metabolite. A tiny
miscalculation of the dose size can take out an adult. Fentanyl is absorbed through the skin, and if you just dust off a powdery surface with a hand it can lead to unconsciousness and cardiorepiratory arrest.

We use Fentanyl all the time at work. It's effective and safe if carefully used with electronic monitoring in an ICU or an operating theatre. But NOT as a home or street drug.

There's a modified version called Carfentanyl.

Carfentanyl just got approved by the FDA, and it is 100 times more potent than Fentanyl itself. It's too dangerous in pure form, and has to be used in solution. Is this really a good idea, given the
data? The margin for error was razor thin before.

Arguably the most at-risk population for suicides is the younger veterans. Carfentanyl was approved specifically for use on battlefields. So every US soldier is going to learn about it. it's an obvious
giant time bomb. Maybe they should have called it Hearsefentanyl.

make it like microdot acid on blotter paper. Why is this even needed?

Was it approved as a medication or as chemical weapon? I'm asking because Carfentanyl is used as an incapacitating agent by the Russian Special Forces.

Merci Jacques, you just answered mon question

 

[Necronaught]

The stronger the drug the less required, thus manufacturing is cheap, and profits remain high and rising (just like the junkies). Also release some of the uncut stuff in impoverished inner cities which need cleaning up and a few junkies will purge themselves. Those flats/apartments you just built suddenly are more expensive, since the beggars suddenly went away.

 

[Dural]

This popped up on Reddit. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/dec/01/dark-web-dealers-voluntary-ban-deadly-fentanyl

If Fentanyl is being voluntarily banned (by some sites) from being sold on the dark web it must be really really bad.

I guess if carfentanyl is being mixed by hospital pharmacies and administered by medical professionals, that's about as safe for the patients as it's likely to get I suppose. My medical training is what I have read on the back of an elastoplast box but presumably they would be diluting it to the extent where accidentally giving someone double the amount wouldn't be dangerous? Hopefully the hospital pharmacies / drug companies aren't going to mix up milli and micro