Fentanyl-Laced Cocaine Is Overtaking Miami

[Northside904]

Will this mean that Miami returns to the violent days of the 80's and 90's with the potential for a drug war?

[elias9193]

Originally Posted by Northside904

Will this mean that Miami returns to the violent days of the 80's and 90's with the potential for a drug war?

Its not just Miami this stuff is hitting every big city in the US, its going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

[Bobdreamz]

Originally Posted by elias9193

Its not just Miami this stuff is hitting every big city in the US, its going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

It's also hitting conservative suburban areas as well.....

Fentanyl: Drug dealers charged with homicide | WFTV

[mooksmom]

Originally Posted by elias9193

Its not just Miami this stuff is hitting every big city in the US, its going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

You are exactly correct and West Virginia of all places is up at the top of the worst in the opioid users AND the most 'scripts witten,per capita, followed by Alabama and Tennessee. WHY? Partly because in those states manufacturing, and manual labor careers have lots of injuries PLUS at the same time (the 90s-2010) Psychiatrists decided that PAIN should be an added vital sign, and they developed the Wong-Baker Pain Scale (aka" Happy face scale). At this time, BIG PHARMA also brought out new and 'big gun' pain meds...MS-Contin, Oxycontin, Fentanyl patches, etc. and distributed all across the country. What other final outcome COULD there be with this trifecta in place?
WE (at least the ER employed personnel I worked with across the USA) did NOT want the Wong-Baker scale at all. We already had FT jobs dealing with drug addicts in our ERs that kept us more than busy checking that they had rides home, were not going ER to ER for drugs. HIPAA laws got enacted at this same time so we could no longer warn close by ERs of who was on the way to see them from ours. We voiced our complaints to hospital Administrators but they were afraid to make patients "mad" in the thought they might go, with their insurance, to another facility. They told us point blank, "Let the narcotics flow like the Mississippi River". If we didn't go along with it, we could seek employment elsewhere.
Now, we have China, Afghanistan, South America, Mexico ALL importing illicitly made heroin, fentanyl, carfentanil into our country from labs in theirs. It comes into our ports and Id bet via Customs, too. It's potent, EZ to transport this way and a lot lighter in weight than cocaine. HERE is our opioid crisis...the killer heroin/fentanyl combo is NOT home grown. Yes! Certain states, FLORIDA being one of them, bloomed with the opioid pill mills but in honesty I knew of people making trips from Tennessee TO Florida to go to these pill mills monthly rather than deal with MDs in TN. As many as a dozen of them would "do a road trip" via van OR would just fly down there, go to the pill mill, stay over night in a few hotel rooms and fly or drive back. Never stopped, never a question asked.
It's a sad time for us chronic pain patients. My own MD, a Neurologist, closed up his office and now doles out Suboxone and nothing else from a home office where he sees only CASH patients...calls it 'concierge medicine'. The DEA and low payments from insurance/Medicare/Medicaid got to him and turned him into a Suboxone Zombie Doctor. I cannot wait to see what a whole generation of Suboxone users will look like, as it's not been around long enough to know what the long term side effects are and is used 'off brand' for pain patients. I will not be trying it. I will stick to ES Tylenol, for now, and hope it doesn't destroy my healthy liver.