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With the epidemic in America on the issue of opioid caused deaths, there is a high demand for some answers as to how we can end this preventable problem. Opioid-related deaths have decreased in the 23 states that have legalized medical marijuana by almost 25%. This statistic allows many people, doctors, and even President Obama to rethink marijuana’s drug scheduling and consider its medical proponents. However, there is still a lot of concern with making marijuana the primary resource to fix the epidemic issue for multiple reasons that I will discuss throughout my following posts.
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The other main thing that is being highly considered now by the Federal government, mayors, and some doctors is creating a “Safe Space” for addicts. This means that there will be governmentally and state funded places where users can go to administer their drug of choice under the supervision of nurses. This allows people to be monitored, and if something goes wrong, a nurse is already on site to give correct antidotes to save lives from overdosing. Within the facility, there are other things provided such as sterile items to use and available counseling. There are only a handful of cities in America looking into this so far including San Francisco and Ithaca in New York. However, there are a few countries including Canada, Europe, and Australia that already have this type of facility and it seems to be working for them. This idea to solve the epidemic crises also has some controversial aspects to it, to which will be mentioned in my following posts as well.
In regards to there being an argument on whether or not medical marijuana is a better alternative to solve the opioid epidemic opposed to having safe spaces, there is not one. However, these are the two most thought about ways to solve the epidemic at hand. Therefore, I will conduct my following papers on statistics and information to both prove and disprove why both are/should be discussed at all. And hopefully, by the end of the series, there will be a more credible suitor to solve the opioid issue in America. Although, both sides of my question are being argued within groups of people on whether or not they will work, just individually.
The supporters of medical marijuana or legalization, in general, are now 52% of American’s. More people are starting to see that the naturally grown medicine has a lot of powerful medicinal effects including but not limited to curing cancer, helps PTSD and depressed people of all backgrounds, and helps with all types of pain from PMS cramps to chronic pain. This last reason is why medical marijuana is being considered to help decrease deaths related to opioid overdoses. In 2014, almost 30,000 people died from opioid overdoses in America. More of these deceased people than not did not have their own prescription of opioids but the addiction to the magical pill that makes your brain numb is not hard to obtain if you know where to look. Whether these people wanted to get rid of pain or just to feel nothing at all – obtained just that by taking opioids. However, medical marijuana connects to the same pain management receptors in our brains as painkillers. The difference is that you cannot overdose on cannabis like you can on pills, making for a better alternative for pain medication. In 2015, President Obama and his administration made doing research on marijuana a whole lot easier. Before then there was not a lot of information on the medicinal effects that cannabis possesses due to it being a schedule one drug. With such a high schedule attached it makes a proclamation that there are no therapeutic or medical aspects, leading to more arrests for users opposed to being medication for those in pain. In my following post, there will be more statistics and information as to why medical marijuana is a better candidate for pain management medication compared to opioids.
On the flip side of that, non-supporting people of medical marijuana fear that people just want to legalize cannabis to push for recreational use. As well as that people are still skeptical of the medical factors of the plant. There is also the matter of if marijuana can work in the same ways as opioids regarding pain management – which it cannot. It helps with pain but does not take it fully away the way opioids do. There is also the concern that cannabis cannot be tested in the same sense that opioids can. Cannabis can be tested for potency and impurities, but it is not as easy to do opposed to testing man-made painkillers in a lab. Medical marijuana growers have to pay close attention to their crop to make sure that it grows correctly. There are states like Michigan where there is “no requirement for testing for impurities and potency before distribution and sale”, thus causing a fear that the medication you receive could potentially do the opposite of what you think it will. All strains are different and have different medical proponents to them, but if the grower does not do it right or test it before a sale, the consumer could do too much or too little or get different effects than assumed before purchase; i.e. becoming more alert than sleepy or vice versa. And all the same, there are still people that fear that it is more of a gateway drug than opioids.
These very opposing aspects in regards to medical marijuana are all important to take into consideration when focusing on a way to decrease the deaths related to opioid overdoses. Regarding what is at stake with going this route, there are a few things that immediately come up. One is the logistics of legalization and what that means for our country. We are still fighting the war on drugs that was proclaimed by President Nixon in 1971, and if legalization or decriminalization of cannabis takes place countrywide that will mean releasing a lot of people from jails and prisons nationwide. Not to mention the financial differences that would have to take place. “The federal government spent over $15 billion on the War on Drugs as well as state and local governments spent at least another 25 billion dollars in 2010.” That means a lot of cops and agents of all kinds had jobs. If you take away, the drug focus how many people have the potential to lose their jobs? As well as stated above, there are health factors to consider because marijuana is not so easily tested, considering we are just now able to conduct reliable research on it. All of this matters because marijuana can be a great resource if used properly. However, there is a lot of change that would take place in America if this is the choice we decide on.
Those in support of safe injection sites are monumentally smaller in comparison than those of medical marijuana. However, that is due to it not being as promoted or known of. Safe injection sites just recently became a topic here in America, and it is highly debated. Due to the opioid epidemic being so bad, people are almost at a loss for how to fix the issue. People have thought of few things including creating new formulations of drugs so they cannot be crushed or snorted, federally crack down on doctors so that prescriptions are harder to obtain (which is a leading cause in people going from pills to regular heroin), give different forms of opioids (Methadone, Buprenorphine, and Naltrexone) to help ease people off of the addiction, and different types of therapy including behavioral are all out there. However, none of these are working to the capacity that we need them to, leading us to the thought of safe spaces for addicts.
Prevention of drug abuse is clearly not working, and neither are current treatments for addiction. This is why those in support of safe spaces think it is more important to let people do what they will but give them a place to be safe and have medical aid immediately if needed. There are already 2-5 overdoses a week in Boston’s Supportive Place for Observation and Treatment being changed from deaths to surviving the overdose. By giving these people a safe place to go, they are saving their lives and provide them with a place to seek professional help for recovery. The few locations in the country all have slightly different parameters for how to go about their safe space, which is where some of the controversies come in. Some sites want people to come just when they are already high so that they can be safe. Others want people to be able to get high at the facility so that they are already there and safe since not everyone will make their way to the location after getting high.
A major controversial point in allowing safe spaces to be used to decrease opioid deaths are the fact that by allowing such to take place, it is as if we as a country are allowing or permitting drug use and abuse. This reason is why there are people opposed to this being a considered form of treatment. Dr. Barbara Herbert asks a very plausible question,”does it encourage people to keep using if we make their lives less dangerous and less miserable, or can we scare people into care?”.
Safe spaces pose some tricky factors including money and how each place will be regulated. Just like marijuana this issue will have to go state by state because allowing drugs to be okay is federally illegal. So, there is the stake of not every state being able to have access to this form of treatment. From where will the money be funded? What would that cost Americans? These are important questions to consider because they matter. As there is information continuing to come out with this idea, there will be more answered questions. However, there are many pros and cons to choosing safe spaces as a primary opioid addiction treatment.
