Drug Dealers - Part #1

There is one subject I have successfully avoided writing about thus far in this blog. Cases involving Prescription Drugs.
My avoidance is self conflict-based.
Without medications, many of our loved ones would be dead -- or living lives filled with cancer, pain, depression, anxiety, physical and emotional anguish.
Prescription medications can one of life's biggest blessings....
and among life's worst burdens.
They give life and they take life.
And in my humble opinion, curing diseases, stopping infections, saving lives, replacing chemical levels in brains that require those chemicals to function normally.... this is the purpose of pharmaceuticals.

The quandry lies on the razor's edge, the thin line of physical and psychological demarcation.
It's the line between use and abuse, taking the right pill not the wrong one, balancing dosages and side effects.

There are no safety nets when you are given cocktails of prescription meds
When I ask clients what meds they are on, I get laundry lists: one for high blood pressure; another for cholestrol; this for allergies; that for shaky legs, this for depression, that to help sleep through the night; this for occasional anxiety attacks. Individually each of these meds has side effects. Collectively, the side effects are compounded and the end result can be catastrophic.

I think the whole problem really kicked into high gear when the cigarette ads were forced off the air. Taking their place are drug ads for adults. And alcohol ads and tv commercials targeted at young adults. The pharmaceutical companies send you to your doctor for scripts. And tv spots from liquor companies tell kids to "drink responsibly" when we all know:. "one's too many and a thousand's not enough".

Do a demographic study of America's jails and prisons and I contend, most people are there because of drugs or alcohol. Crimes are committed when high. Or people arrested while getting high, carrying, or distributing everything from weed to heroin. America's rehabs and psychiatric hospitals are filled with people who are there because of mind altering substances.

People go insane on meds. Some stick with the tranquilizers -- benzos, valium or xanax (A.K.A. - Vitamin X)
The depressed get uppers, and the manic get downers from their docs.
Little kids with an excess of energy are given Ritalin -- which is sold in schools to other kids for the high.
Long gone is the concept of kids being high with energy and life, now they are hyper kids; or adults who go through depressive episodes because life is depressing.
And now even young men are sold Viagra.
Some self medicate with alcohol or pot.
Other prefer the Russian Roulette approach, heroin or Meth.
In this investigators opinion, it has gotten out of hand.

The adults who are hooked and need more than the doctor will give them, get their drugs from friends; other docs (this is called doctor shopping); or through the internet.
Some, who made the mistake of doing Meth just once,discover how incredibly energizing that first high can be, are thereby usually lost forever. Some go so far as to manufacture their own in kitchen Meth labs.

It's really very frightening the first time this reality, this truth. hits you. I've grown used to it over the years, though the subject still causes me enough angst or anger, that I have avoided blogging about it. Until now.

Over the years, I have done many medical malpractice cases, a large part aimed at pharmaceutical companies whose medications have killed clients, caused strokes, generated diseases, or irrevocably damaged a client's body or brain.

When cigarette commercials were pulled off the TV airwaves, the ad space was filled by pills to be pushed, so the Pharmaceutical companies bought ad space like there's no tomorrow.
Their approach is describe symptoms you may be having, they tell you to tell your doc you need this drug. Then they tell you about the side effects.
The key is the side effects.
Listen hard to those.
And know, the doctors they tell you see have a whole stockpile of free samples to give out, fresh from the drug companies running the tv spots.

The stories I could tell you about this subject could fill a book.
Instead, I'll tell you some of these stories in this blog.
My intent is to give you a layout of the land. Because statistically speaking, it appears people are dying from prescription pills overdoses now at a rate that may be exceeding those dying in auto accidents.
Stay tuned for part two.