
Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic - antigizmo
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/07/01/coronavirus-drug-overdose/
======
mnm1
People are desperate. This is to be expected. Along with unemployment,
loneliness, hopelessness, helplessness, stress, fear, and anxiety have all
risen greatly. This is how people cope when they are not in control of their
lives and especially when they don't see a path to regain that control. I
would expect more of this. Drug overdoses were already a huge issue because of
societal issues. Now, they will be even more so. In a society with no
community and poor job prospects, prospects for the future look bleak. Can't
really blame people for wanting something to console them in such bleak times.
For many, it went from bleak to dire and horrific. The handling of the
pandemic is just the latest way that society has failed so many.

Being the richest country on earth and also the one with the worst virus
situation can also lead to cognitive dissonance for many people. Envy of other
places that are handling the situation better is another thing that can lead
people to despair. As is having no leader or leadership, no direction, no
goal, no plan, and no idea of what the future will bring.

It's a nationwide disaster that people are simply not ready to deal with. Many
people here have no idea what suffering is and therefore, they don't know how
to suffer or how to get through such times. Suffering is externalized onto
minorities and other unwanted people in society so that the well off don't
have to deal with it. Now everyone's suffering and many simply can't cope with
the suffering or with the additional suffering. Many resort to childish
behaviors like refusing to wear masks or social distance to make themselves
feel better by hurting others. A lot of people simply never grew up and now
that suffering is inevitable, feel like they should be getting an exemption.

~~~
TheGrim-888
I'm not sure I agree with the statement that the US has the "worst virus
situation".

It has some of the most cases, sure, if you compare it by population though,
it's still high, but it's not horrible. The US is #12 for cases per capita,
most European countries are between 4,000-6,000 cases per capita, while the US
is at 8,500, which is definitely more. But fewer people die per capita than in
the UK, France, Spain, Sweden, Italy, and some other minor countries.

It isn't like the US has orders of magnitude more infections per capita, and
there's more people dying per capita in many other major countries. In such
countries you'd have about the same chance of catching the virus, and a
greater change of dying, as in the US.

The majority of people that are refusing to wear masks are doing so because
they believe the science/data supports that decision. You might disagree with
that, and whether the science/data actually supports it is a different
discussion, but they aren't just being "childish" and refusing to follow
recommendations for no reason.

I think there's obviously political power to gain in making the situation look
as bad as possible, so that a group can then use that as a foothold to advance
their own political policies. It's unfortunate that the issue is so political
already. But you can easily tell when it's happening when people are referring
to "society failing" and needing to "reshape society" and saying how horrible
it is in the US when it really isn't that bad, etc. You can't advance new
politics without a narrative of the old way of things being bad.

I guess you can easily argue that there's political power for me to downplay
the situation and make it look as good as possible, in order to prevent new
politics from advancing. And that's true. But it's good to at least share both
sides of the story.

~~~
gdulli
> if you compare it by population though, it's still high, but it's not
> horrible.

> But fewer people die per capita than in the UK, France, Spain, Sweden,
> Italy, and some other minor countries.

You listed the countries with more deaths per capita. Excluding countries with
< 10,000 cases, there are 6. The 5 you mentioned, plus Belgium.

That means every other country in the world has fewer deaths per capita. The
US is the 7th worst out of 66 countries. You can say that you're satisfied
with that standing, but you can't say we're doing well.

Disappointment with that metric may greatly overlap with partisan
disappointment in the current administration. But Occam's razor suggests the
former does not require the latter.

~~~
xbmcuser
Another thing is most of those countries the virus has stopped spreading or is
slowing down in the US it is accelerating with the last 3 days each being
record for new cases

------
Tiktaalik
Gotta love how everyone is applauding the wisdom of Dr. Bonnie Henry in her
success in keeping the coronavirus under control in British Columbia and that
of the government for following all her recommendations, and yet when Dr.
Henry suggests that to tackle the opioid overdose epidemic, that BC needs to
decriminalize drugs and create a safe supply of drugs for the addicted,
suddenly everyone stops listening to her.

Drug overdose deaths in BC in May eclipsed covid 19 deaths for the entire
year. You'd think people would be a bit more concerned about drug overdoses
and willing to listen to the provincial health officer and follow her
recommendations.

[https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/overdose-
dea...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/overdose-deaths-
bc-1.5607792)

~~~
azinman2
It's easy to blame people for their own choice in doing drugs. Or get numb to
it as isn't a new issue. But a pandemic causing an excess of deaths and huge
uncertainly that could infect every person just for living a normal life is
fundamentally different.

My prediction is that America seems unable/unwilling to do what's required to
stem covid (lack of federal leadership is just horrific here), and as such,
America will chose money over lives. It always has. And at that point, sucks
to be you if you got covid and die from it -- it'll just be like any other
death in America.... largely ignored as a collective.

------
WilTimSon
Hardly a surprise, I'm sure suicide rates and alcohol consumption are going up
as well. It's a combination of loneliness, lack of supervision (can't find a
better word, I mean someone who could help in case of an overdose), despair
about the future. This pandemic is unprecedented for the modern people, many
don't have the means to deal with it psychologically.

~~~
starkd
A doom and gloom from the media isn't helping either. It's one thing to
provide information, but the endless speculation about "how bad its going to
get" is irresponsible.

~~~
dkdk8283
The media stopped being about journalism long ago. It’s now infotainment. Our
media is destroying the USA.

~~~
collyw
>Our media is destroying the USA.

I think this is incredibly true. And it is spreading to other parts of the
world.

There is a lot of sensationalism, around black lives matter protests, and very
little objective analysis of the "problem". It seems incredibly irresponsible
considering the results.

I would urge everyone to listen to (or read) what Sam Harris says in his
podcast on the topic, he brings some objectivity and rationality back to the
discussion. You feel like there is still some sanity left in the world after
listening to it.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmgxtcbc4iU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmgxtcbc4iU)

[https://samharris.org/can-pull-back-brink/](https://samharris.org/can-pull-
back-brink/)

------
maerF0x0
Back when this started I made the claim that the long term consequences of
lock down would exceed the short term benefits .

Depression, Drugs overdose, murder (despair), Suicide, extra sedentary issues
leading to diabetese/CVD, loss of jobs/meaning et al.

I havent seen anyone do the math of the uptick there to talk about the
marginal benefit of lockdown or the fact that this, once again, is a form of
biased benefit for the elderly at the expense of the younger (elderly more
likely to die, younger more likely to suffer harder from lockdown)

~~~
victorhooi
I hear these sorts of sentiments from the USA a lot - where apparently people
are actively rioting and protesting against the health lockdown.

I'm from Australia - where while we've had some grumblings about the health
measures, on the whole, we've been pretty lucky. Our death toll is 104 people
- which even though (comparative) low is still a tragedy.

Yet the USA death toll is over 130,000 people - that is a terrible thing =(. I
do not get how the USA can be so blase about it.

And that is _with_ measures in place (although I'm sure there are breaches).
Imagine if you simply let it run rampant, and let the health system get
overhwelmed? (See Italy).

It does seem like its overwhelming the young who are very laid back about
COVID-19, and chaff the most at restrictions.

To be frank - that seems very selfish.

Imagine if the virus had a 30% mortality rate in your cohort? You'd be
terrified.

(I'm young, with two young kids under 5. My parents refused to see me or our
kids for a couple of months, out of fear they might catch it from us - I
missed them as did their grandkids, but I understand why - it must have been
scary for them).

And even that aside - have you considered that a lot of the economic downturn
isn't from the actual health measures in place - but from the uncertainty,
doubt and fear caused by a virus pandemic? People are scared, and that's
naturally going to curb some spending. We are a interlinked global economy,
and you cannot escape that.

I hope that we'll have a vaccine soon, so we can go back to normal - but in
lieu of that, trying to stamp out the virus or contain it isn't a bad goal.

~~~
makomk
Australia is still much earlier on in its pandemic than the US and other
countries. Wait until the lockdowns are national, and going on for months,
with no prospect of any way out in sight.

~~~
monocasa
They aren't much earlier; they got cases almost the same time as the US.
They're just handling it way better. And it's not like Australia is a
particularly well run country.

[https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/australia/](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/australia/)

------
elchief
For Vancouverites, you can get free take-home drug testing kits, here:

[http://www.vch.ca/public-health/harm-reduction/overdose-
prev...](http://www.vch.ca/public-health/harm-reduction/overdose-prevention-
response/drug-checking)

There's not a _whole_ lotta point, since everything has Fentanyl in it these
days, except pot (probably)

And free Naloxone (Narcan) kits at Shopper's Drug Mart, London Drugs, and
other places:

[https://towardtheheart.com/site-finder](https://towardtheheart.com/site-
finder)

They only ask your age and whether this is your first kit. No ID required

There were 131 overdose calls in Vancouver yesterday

~~~
refurb
It’s only a matter of time before hard drugs are legalized, similar to
marijuana. It’ll probably take 20 years, but we will get there.

I know Vancouver setup a legal opioid vending machine as a test run. Doctor
checks you out, prescribes a legal opioid (hydromorphone in this case). You
scan your badge and your dose pops out.

No more stealing, prostituing, robbing, or other “hustle”. You just take your
dose. Much lower risk of overdose and far fewer complications from shooting
street drugs.

I’ve read about addicts in these types of programs and suddenly they don’t
have to hustle for 12 hours a day. They can get a job. Or, they just have the
time to stop and think about their life and what direction they want it to go
in.

Not claiming it’s a panacea at all. But it’s better than the situation we’re
in now.

~~~
jnathsf
Another perspective is to look at traditional use of opiates in cultures
before they were illegal. Raw opium has a much higher ratio of lethal dose to
effective dose vs heroin. For example in parts of India elderly will take some
opium with their chai to ease the discomforts of old age. While you may become
addicted it’s unlikely you will overdose.

A big part of the potency of recreational drugs is due to its illegality
forcing suppliers to pack as much of a punch in the smallest package. Another
contributing factor is Western culture - you don’t see a huge demand for low
potency cannabis. People like their drugs strong.

------
eezurr
If anyone here is "losing it" from your routine being destroyed and your city
being shut down, I highly, highly recommend you take a week (preferably 2) off
and do as much outdoor activity as possible. You should not return home during
this period. This will reset your brain because it will break your new covid19
routine with new activities and new location.

When you come back, use this new state of mind to change your routine before
you settle back into the state you were in before you left.

~~~
Beefin
yep! go wilderness camping. resets everything! circadian rhythm, routine,
mental fog, etc. and added benefit of understanding how insignificant you are
in the world :) optimistic nihilism.

------
Darmody
I lived alone for 2 years but most of the day I was out, working and doing my
stuff. Some weekends when I had nothing to do and no one to hang out with I
kind of felt what loneliness is. Not that it was a big problem to me then as I
can entertain myself with a good book, a game, some movies, etc, but several
weeks of that would've been very different.

Loneliness can hit you hard, very hard. And on top of that if you have any
addiction and mental health problems...

~~~
jjtheblunt
Similar : moved cross country for work, felt for a few days lonely, then
somehow thought "not as lonely as pets in shelters", adopted one, total
improvement for both!

~~~
Darmody
Good to hear. Pets are amazing.

~~~
jjtheblunt
Especially at least pairs: when the human is tired, they are like "oh well;
let's play with one another".

------
coco1729
In terms of healthy life-years lost, stay-at-home orders could be much, much
worse than complete freedom at this point.

Depression causes more lost life years than cancer, AIDs, and war combined
(without even accounting for how depression can cause things like alcoholism
and heart disease) (source: The Noonday Demon). So it's not unreasonable to
guess that the increased anxiety and depression from quarantining could be
much more detrimental in terms of years lost in aggregate.

For a personal anecdote, my grandfather who was in a nursing home died during
the pandemic. It wasn't from covid-19 but I certainly think the quarantine
accelerated his death (and prevented any family members from seeing him in his
last days even after trying desperately).

I know it's easy for someone young like me to say this, not being in much
personal danger from exposure. Also, I do think we were rational to lock down
early on when we didn't know much about the virus. But I do think we need to
really attempt to quantify the indirect damages of quarantining vs not at this
point. We may find that the morals of the American left don't match the
reality.

------
lalos
Well, right before the pandemic hit it was being reported that deaths of
despair were up ticking so I doubt that trend has change with more pressure in
the system.

March 23: [https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/03/23/why-
americans-...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/03/23/why-americans-
are-dying-from-despair)

~~~
eezurr
First thing when you open the article:

>Suspected overdoses nationally jumped 18 percent in March, 29 percent in
April and 42 percent in May, data from ambulance teams, hospitals and police
shows.

~~~
lalos
Keyword to notice on my comment: "reported"

I was stating a fact that all this was already being reported on before
quarantine and added a link with a date for more context. The lion thinks
everyone is like him.

------
yingw787
I remember talking to a technically minded friend about my clinical
depression, and I remember how she mentioned building an app to help solve it.
I remember thinking at the time how sometimes building an app isn't the
solution to a problem.

Sometimes the best solutions are the simplest, most straightforward, and the
least innovative ones: voting in policymakers who craft empathetic public
policy, donating to charity, being there for a friend.

Hope you all are doing well :)

~~~
rohitb91
That's a hilarious sort of tech delusion that people make fun of

Surely a react app is the only thing in the way between global peace and
happiness and harmony, let's just make a nice webpage and raise hundreds of
millions of dollars for it :)

~~~
Florin_Andrei
> _That 's a hilarious sort of tech delusion_

When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

------
p1mrx
40% seems low... how many more are just undiscovered? A lot of people stopped
going to work / paying bills / attending events this year, so it's probably
getting more difficult to notice when someone is dead.

------
pstrateman
The same is happening in Canada, it's because addicts are able to get money
from the government and they buy far more drugs than they're used to having.

Edit: all the people downvoting me, why? not a single comment

seriously, this isn't a theory, it's just the facts

[https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cerb-pandemic-opioid-
addict...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cerb-pandemic-opioid-addiction-
overdose-1.5606188)

~~~
ethanbond
Potentially a factor, but don’t you also think widespread unemployment and
general trauma - collective and individual - could play a role?

~~~
starkd
Drug addiction will cause people to do truly unthinkable things. They get a
wad of cash, the only thing they think about is drugs, and to hell with
anything else. It's amazing how it re-prioritizes the structure of the brain.

~~~
quickthrowman
As someone who has experienced it, it’s absolutely unreal just how thoroughly
your priorities shift towards the substance. Everything revolves around it,
nothing and no one else matters until that need is fulfilled.

I’m glad I’ve escaped that hellacious ride (for now)

------
coco1729
In terms of healthy life-years lost, stay-at-home orders could be much, much
worse than complete freedom.

Depression causes more lost life years than cancer, AIDs, and war combined
(without even accounting for how depression can cause things like alcoholism
and heart disease) (source: The Noonday Demon). So it's not unreasonable to
guess that the increased anxiety and depression from quarantining could be
much more detrimental in terms of years lost in aggregate.

For a personal anecdote, my grandfather who was in a nursing home died during
the pandemic. It wasn't from covid-19 but I certainly think the quarantine
accelerated his death (and prevented any family members from seeing him in his
last days even after trying desperately).

I know it's easy for someone young like me to say this, not being in much
personal danger from exposure. But I do think we need to really look at
indirect damages of quarantining. We may find that the American left has had
the morals of this situation all wrong.

------
flattone
A lot of drug trade has stopped due to border closures. Obviously cannot
reveal sources. I guess technically i am the source of info, knowing folks who
are nervous to make house payments due to mexico border

~~~
perardi
A lot of not-that-illegal-but-still-illegal drugs that are manufactured in
bulk in China and India are still coming in just fine.

Source: my sources.

~~~
flattone
Whats the confrontational tone for?

~~~
monocasa
I didn't read that as confrontational, just a frank statement on a topic that
lends itself to being discussed in vague terms.

------
kukx
There are more and more reasons to open back the economy. Does it make sense
to keep stalling? Most likely some people will avoid the infection this way,
but at what cost to others.

~~~
prostoalex
From [https://www.wsj.com/articles/masks-could-help-stop-
coronavir...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/masks-could-help-stop-coronavirus-
so-why-are-they-still-controversial-11593336601)

> Hong Kong, with 7.5 million residents, is one of the most densely populated
> places on earth, but recorded only six deaths from Covid-19 despite having
> no lockdown and receiving nearly 350,000,travelers a day from abroad until
> authorities started reducing cross-border travel on January 30.

> The key secret of Hong Kong’s success, Prof. Yuen said, is that the mask
> compliance rate during morning rush hour is 97%. The 3% who don’t comply are
> mainly Americans and Europeans, he said.

...

> The Czech Republic was the first European country to impose mandatory mask-
> wearing in some public spaces on March 18, before it recorded the first
> death by Covid-19. It has since reduced the number of daily new infections
> to below 50 and has one of the lowest coronavirus death rates in the world.

~~~
clairity
unlike the implication of the wsj title, the real takeaway is that physical
distancing is the primary mechanism of prevention, with mask-wearing for when
you can't distance (like during rush hour in hong kong). it's not lockdowns,
it's not masks all the time, and it's not _no_ masks all the time. it's both
more nuanced and simpler than most people, on all sides, want to accept.

------
thug_life
it's washington post, so any of this may or may not be true.

------
williesleg
No kidding, just read all the shit in the news and here on what's supposed to
be a tech news site, it's enough to make anybody do that.

------
drtillberg
I'm cynical enough at this point to wonder whether the states will add these
terrible losses to the COVID-19-related statistics to advocate for stricter
and longer lock-downs.

~~~
nxc18
States have been chomping at the bit to end their lockdowns. The fact that
cases are spiking again is precisely because states were too eager to end
their lockdowns.

China had a brutal lockdown early and thanks to that they are now largely back
in business. Anti-lockdown sentiment early on is precisely the reason the US
has had to prolong its suffering. The reason long lockdowns are happening is
because we can’t muster strict.

~~~
commandlinefan
> had a brutal lockdown early and thanks to that they are now largely back in
> business

Wait, that doesn't make sense - are you saying that they locked down long
enough that everybody who had the virus "lost it" (either by getting healthy
or dying)? That doesn't sound very plausible given what we know about
epidemiology. The lockdown was sold here as a way to "flatten the curve":
everybody who would have gotten it will still get it, but not all at once, so
the hospitals won't be overwhelmed. Is anybody claiming that China's lockdown
actually eradicated the virus within its borders entirely?

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Entirely? No. Nobody (I think) is claiming that.

But if you lock down so that each infected person, on average, infects less
than one new person, and you do it long enough, then yes, you can completely
eliminate the virus that way. And yes, that is perfectly consistent with what
we know about epidemiology.

The cure may literally be worse than the disease, but we could do that.

But there comes a point where the number of cases is small enough that you use
testing and contact tracing to do the rest.

------
dkdk8283
Despair deaths will be the true toll of this pandemic. I feel very sorry for
everyone who is getting screwed by the extreme response to the virus.

~~~
mattigames
The delay on the response in America is the real cause of the current
situation including the despair involved, countries such as Japan or New
Zealand that quickly took effective measures such as make everyone use face
mask[0] or early closing of airports are pretty much back to normal already;
America didn't close early, and more troublesome some people took being mask-
less a political matter, others believe a conspiracy around it, and others
render it useless by taking it off every 5 minutes due being mildly
uncomfortable.

[0]
[https://twitter.com/ericgeller/status/1277693321037611013](https://twitter.com/ericgeller/status/1277693321037611013)

~~~
dkdk8283
We did delay but we have to double down: let things run it’s course.

Reversing now and keeping things closed will have far worse devastation in the
long run

~~~
mattigames
Any significant research that supports such claim that I can read?

