Researchers found that naloxone use did not increase relative to the number of overdoses as deaths have fallen since 2023, suggesting that other factors may be driving the national decline in overdose deaths.
Alcohol is actually worse than opiates from nearly every perspective, it’s one of the few addictions that can kill you just for quitting, and regularly killing people on both overdose and chronic usage (plus the societal cost of destroying the lives of people around the alcoholic). Compared to the actual damage your brain and liver takes from a bar dive and the added damage to the social fabric, i’d rather take a bunch of opiates and nod off for a few hours - most problems with opiates come from criminalization and unsafe environments.
I can speak from personal experience with fentanyl withdrawal that there is not much space for “rationality” when the need hits, and the danger becomes an abstract that does not deter anyone. I was hooked by my doctors on medical products and not street heroin, mind you. I’d compare it with the need to drink that glass of water when absolutely dehydrated on a hot day, with added intensity and pain. You are cold and nothing can warm you, your nose wont stop running, you can’t rest because your muscles on every part of your body cramp (worst for me were the cramps in the musculature around/between the shoulder blades which prevented me from keeping any position longer than a few minutes, closely followed by the intestinal cramping), and every single thought in your brain revolves around getting the next hit to get out of this situation, just as you would think about finally getting that glass of water you crave.
The body produces opiates for itself in small amounts, but if you add them externally, 2 things happen that make it a bodily need: your body reduces the amount of opiates it produces (which have an important function in regulating body temperature and muscle tone), and your body tones down the intense signal, so whatever opiates your body produces are not enough to keep everything running. Getting that system back to normal working conditions can take a pretty long time.
And then there is the aspect that the feeling opiates give you is not experienceable in any other way. It’s like the warmest, softest hug you’ll ever get, and a state of bliss. This makes it hard for people like me who already have psychiatric issues and recurring depression to even consider stopping - nothing else i’ve experienced in my life has ever come even close to that wave that washes over you and takes away all the pain and doubt.
I only was lucky enough to confess my problems to my primary care physician in a phase of acute withdrawal - i just couldn’t take the rollercoaster of “high or in withdrawal” anymore - that landed me in a substitution program. I am still addicted, but without both the positive and negative sides messing with me i can manage my life.
Alcohol is actually worse than opiates from nearly every perspective, it’s one of the few addictions that can kill you just for quitting, and regularly killing people on both overdose and chronic usage (plus the societal cost of destroying the lives of people around the alcoholic). Compared to the actual damage your brain and liver takes from a bar dive and the added damage to the social fabric, i’d rather take a bunch of opiates and nod off for a few hours - most problems with opiates come from criminalization and unsafe environments.
I can speak from personal experience with fentanyl withdrawal that there is not much space for “rationality” when the need hits, and the danger becomes an abstract that does not deter anyone. I was hooked by my doctors on medical products and not street heroin, mind you. I’d compare it with the need to drink that glass of water when absolutely dehydrated on a hot day, with added intensity and pain. You are cold and nothing can warm you, your nose wont stop running, you can’t rest because your muscles on every part of your body cramp (worst for me were the cramps in the musculature around/between the shoulder blades which prevented me from keeping any position longer than a few minutes, closely followed by the intestinal cramping), and every single thought in your brain revolves around getting the next hit to get out of this situation, just as you would think about finally getting that glass of water you crave.
The body produces opiates for itself in small amounts, but if you add them externally, 2 things happen that make it a bodily need: your body reduces the amount of opiates it produces (which have an important function in regulating body temperature and muscle tone), and your body tones down the intense signal, so whatever opiates your body produces are not enough to keep everything running. Getting that system back to normal working conditions can take a pretty long time.
And then there is the aspect that the feeling opiates give you is not experienceable in any other way. It’s like the warmest, softest hug you’ll ever get, and a state of bliss. This makes it hard for people like me who already have psychiatric issues and recurring depression to even consider stopping - nothing else i’ve experienced in my life has ever come even close to that wave that washes over you and takes away all the pain and doubt.
I only was lucky enough to confess my problems to my primary care physician in a phase of acute withdrawal - i just couldn’t take the rollercoaster of “high or in withdrawal” anymore - that landed me in a substitution program. I am still addicted, but without both the positive and negative sides messing with me i can manage my life.
I agree that alcohol is worse in many way and never said otherwise, there are a lot of people putting words into my mouth here.