Xanax and Adderall Access Is Being Blocked by Secret Drug Limits - Slashdot

Posted by BeauHD

• For the last 4 years out of the 10 I've filled the *very same script* from the *same doctor*, I've been lied to about stock. Lied to about the stock of other stores when I ask for an alternative. It's outrageous, but I've found that if I drive my SUV rather than my beater to the pharmacy, I'm about 30% more likely to have a script filled.

  For the last 3 months, I've had all of my scripts sent in digitally and I have not had any problems with filling. It seems it's encouraged to turn away by whatever means possible those who come to the window. Regardless of documented history. It's absolutely miserable.

  I suppose the larger question is: what in the world is going on with the us (in the US) that made such madness happen-- both in supply and demand. It feels like I stepped between two parties fighting and now they're pointing fingers at me.

  I would just like to fill this please. Like last month, and the 119 before.

  • Re:

    They'll try any amount of victim blaming to "solve" "the drug problem" but won't spend a single red cent making a better world where the addicts don't feel the need to obliterate themselves, because that would cut into profits. And if you suffer as a result, zero fucks are given for you because that doesn't affect the bottom line.

    • Re:

      Very much this. We are experiencing the direct result of greed and capitalism with no consequences. It's only going to get worse while we allow politicians to be in the pocket of the people getting rich off others suffering.

      PS - this is not just a problem in the US.

    • Re:

      Once again, politicians overreact....a few "bad" people/criminals abuse something, and the politicians first instinct is to make life MUCH harder for the majority of law abiding citizens.

  • Re:

    I'm confused. Does the pharmacy go and check the parking lot and ask you for your license plate? Or is this another one of those absurd American "I'm afraid I'm too unfit to get out of my car - drive through" experiences?

    I think fundamentally the USA is using all the wrong metrics for all the wrong reasons when it comes to judging people. You're right though with the blame issue. The opioid crisis is not caused by people picking up their medication or pharmacies filling scripts. They were caused by big-phar

  • Re:

    I suppose the larger question is: what in the world is going on with the us (in the US) that made such madness happen– both in supply and demand. It feels like I stepped between two parties fighting and now they’re pointing fingers at me.

    The [youtube.com] Sacklers [youtube.com] happened [youtube.com].

  • Re:

    It's the same thing as the entire rest of our healthcare system. Healthcare in the US consists of three primary tenets. Number one? Suffer. Unless you have lots and lots of money. Then you can suffer a little less. Number two? Give the medical / health insurance / pharma industry money. LOTS AND LOTS of money. Then give them a little more. Then give them some more. What do you mean you expect some form of alleviation from the suffering for that money? I'm sorry. You should probably pay still more if you wan

  • Re:

    I suppose the larger question is: what in the world is going on with the us (in the US) that made such madness happen-- both in supply and demand. It feels like I stepped between two parties fighting and now they're pointing fingers at me.

    Easy. Purdue Pharma and The Sackler family.

    Purdue Pharma created OxyContin, basically the opiod that got overprescribed and a bunch of people addicted and dependent.

    The Sacklers have done just enough legal wrangling to ensure that any lawsuit against Purdue doesn't touch t

• High demand assures retailers get top dollar for their high quality narcotics. If you'll pay high prices for name brand Adderall and Xanax, then you wont have any problem. They just aren't interested in dealing with old sick people with no money to spend. It's no fun dispensing any schedule "Jones" narcotics for anything less than full cash retail Viagra prices. No generics, placebos, no cheapo baby aspirin. If they deal with drugstore cowboys, DEA, strung out grannies, and blue cross, then they damn

• They claim we can't be trusted to pick and choose what we need to function, but apparently impartial well trained 3rd parties can't be trusted either.

  Yeah, I don't need to sleep. BTW if you don't know, that's a great way to trigger mania in some people. Just stay up all the time. I can attest. The one time I was hospitalized I just couldn't sleep more than a few (3-4 max) hours a day, often less than that. But they can't offer benzodiazipines because a-holes will take them and drink to feel great (aka

  • Re: I'm hit too...I hate it here.

    Jup, went through something similar. Refused to take the addictive stuff. Got through with sertraline, but suffered from insomnia for roughly 3 months. 3 hours sleep, sometimes 4. Went to a sleep clinic. Nothing physically wrong. They said it actually could be a lot worse and told me I had to accept what I was going through and to be patient while the sertraline did its thing. Big note though, I was financially safe thanks to government support and a financial buffer I created for emergencies. That makes a

  • Re:

    But they can’t offer benzodiazipines because a-holes will take them and drink to feel great (aka like qualudes or however you spell em in the 60’s and 70’s I assume).

    Quaaludes

• Trying to fill my special lady's prescription has become a hassle and a half - driving all over the damn place looking for a pharmacy that has Adderall available. Who the f-k decided what the limits should be? They're doing a rotten f-ing job.

  Good job finding something else government can't do right.

  • Re:

    Governments can do this just fine - my medicine is always available on time and free (at the point of use). There may be problems with your healthcare system, but they aren't caused by the fact that a government is involved, just by how you've chosen to set the system up.

    • Re:

      you’ve chosen to set the system up.

      Do you really think we had any say in the matter?

      • Re:

        The French certainly seem to have solved the problem of getting the current government to listen to them, so that's not an insoluble problem.

  • Re:

    A lack of Ritalin nearly killed my grandmother. That was before this, because I’d be dangerously fucking livid if I had to drive halfway across the state to find the my-grandma-keeps-breathing pills, and I would have been the one tasked with picking up her prescription back then.

    • • Re:

        She lapsed into a coma when she was admitted for an unrelated cancer-related thing.
        
        The doctors told us to let her go in her sleep.
        
        My mom made a huge fuss and she got her drugs. She woke up, and lived another decade.

• Any Controlled Substance in terms of Pharmacology has implications for addiction or other adverse side effects and why they're controlled.
  in the US, we have a massive problem with legal pharmaceutical abuse, destroying lives and families. The blame needs to be squarely put on the shoulders of Big Pharma and the US gov't as well as doctors Another way to look at it is that no medication whether prescribed or over the counter should be viewed with caution. Even Aspirin has potential side effects that can be

  • We *did* have such a problem. We addressed that problem by massively overcorrecting in classic War on Drugs fashion by implementing policies that completely fuck over people with legitimate medical needs, while doing absolutely nothing to reduce overall abuse, instead just sending everyone to the black market (including people in such agony they're just looking for relief from the pain their doctors now refuse to treat). Then once they're being supplied by the black market, their OD risk spikes through the ceiling compared to pharma products, they commit property crimes to pay the far more exorbitant cost than even the US medical system, and they empower violent gangs and cartels who supply it.
    
    The wave of death can be laid at the feet of drug warriors like you and the CDC who were told that laundering the DEA's non-medical policies would cause one, yet doing it anyway.
    There were ways to address the abuse without making things universally worse for everyone, but that's not what people are interested, they're interested in mindless crackdowns because they don't understand anything more than 'drugs are bad, mmkay?'. So now we have a crisis of untreated medical issues (including pain related suicides where people just take their own life before even getting a chance to OD on fent) and a illegal drug abuse problem that's soared orders of magnitude worse than our former prescription abuse problem.

    • Re:

      The gov't has coarse-grained controls to deal with things but I think largely too we had doctors in most cases writing Rx that the patient didn't need. I agree that there are patients with valid needs but how do you sift through that when you have potentially millions now addicted from a system that just turned a blind eye to it. "oh shit we have to fix this" just somehow doesn't seem to cut it in my book. I have a friend that broke her ankle 4 years ago, after two surgeries to repair the damage she's facin

• Is it now the rare exception that one does not need some form of daily drug dose to function the way society expects?

  • Re:

    I suspect it's an unholy combination of microplastics, hormone disruptors, late-stage capitalism, and a century or two of industrial pollution.

  • Re:

    https://hpi.georgetown.edu/rxd... [georgetown.edu]

    Sadly, yes, half to 2/3 of the country is on something.

    Furthermore, "Data suggests that among those who take prescription medications, the average number of medications taken is four. More than 131 million Americans take at least one prescription medication."

    https://www.singlecare.com/blo... [singlecare.com]

    And this explains why my Dr lost interest in me so quickly when I went in to have a skin something looked at, (it wasn't cancer). Not on any drugs, no profits for him, on to someone more

• I note that the suffering due to lack of medication is preferred over the suffering from inappropriate access to medication. That is a sick goal, but authoritarians have to authoritate. It is a sacrifice we must all make to live in a society.

  • Re:

    That's quite a flight of fantasy. Here's the real reason [texasattorneygeneral.gov] - a $10 billion dollar handout to to people who abused it and then sued them.

• Best anti depressant is weed. The law in this country needs to be reworked, because the natural drugs that occur including mushrooms, weed, coca, and various plant extracts can be used for these purposes. The government is so caught up in their own control laws, that they have developed a stigma about anything that they think may be bad for you and the population just goes along with it like sheep.

  I stand for the Partnership of Drug-Full America.

  • Re:

    I'm very pro weed myself, but this is very bad as blanket advice. Marijuana can interact very badly with some mental health conditions. If you are suffering from a serious chronic mental health condition, please be very carefulw ith all psychoactives including weed and booze.

    • • • Re:

          Just because you aren't paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.

• ... seems to have completely passed by the US domestic Drug Lords. It's almost as if they're protected and incentivized by law.

  Mhmmm, I wonder how that could happen in 'The Land of the Free'(TM)

• People can say all kinds of platitudinous things about the FDA but the real, rubber-hits-the-road fact is:

  The FDA is an organization that ensures that only expensive drugs can make it to market and simultaneously an organization that ensures high prices and availability scarcity in the market.

  This serves the needs of the pharmaceutical corporations just fine. The same corporations that also provide a majority of the working funds for the FDA, so - shocker.

  The biggest problem is that Americans are taught in

• Ignoring all the social/political backbiting that has become the new Slashdot norm, let's look at the problem being stated.

  Some algorithm is setting per pharmacy limits on various drugs in an attempt to preempt abuse by limiting possible supply.

  What are the issues?

  • First come first served. Abusers may get their prescription filled while a legitimate user might not.
  • Specialization. A pharmacy near a depression treatment center might need a bigger allotment than one across town
  • Pharmacy shopping. Anyone wh

  • Re:

    And the tricky part is, if you have a legit prescription and need, you're going to pharmacy shop as well if your first place turns you away.

    My whole immediate family (we're getting older) are all on a bunch of drugs. My brother is the one on the controlled substance, it isn't adderall but similar. The amount of hassle he has to go to for it is insane, like needing to see the doctor every month. And it's all because it's a controlled substance. And it really helps him, but all the controls around it mean

  • Re:

    Yes the problem seems not so much to be poor intentions but rather a hamfisted implementation.

    I would have thought it possible to track prescriptions back to patients and doctors and to deliver sufficient supplies to pharmacies to cover the demand and perhaps to leave a small "float" for contingences without disrupting the bone-fide distribution of drugs.

    Are the companies doing this in the most lame way possible to make a case that they need subsidies to track their distribution ?

• Maybe this is because Xanax and Aderall are being over-prescribed and people don't really need it. The companies see how badly Purdue Pharma and others got effed from oxy being abused and are wary of the same thing happening to them.

• • Not that addictive? I've used anti-depressant and at least the ones I used very much were addictive. What's worse is that the side-effects from dropping them lasted for almost a year afterwards! Never again, that's for sure.

    • Re:

      My side effects lasted longer than I was on antidepressants too.

    • I have used 6 different antidepressants throughout the last decade: sertraline, bupropion, mirtazapine, moclobemide, milnacipran and agomelatine. I was easily able to drop any of them cold turkey and the worst withdrawal symptoms were headaches for a couple of weeks after stopping taking sertraline. Headaches are bearable. So yes, not that addictive.
      There is some seriously addictive shit when it comes to psychopharma but the run off the mill antidepressants aren't.

      • Re:

        2 of the SSRIs I've been one were fine. But the 3rd, citalopram, when I stopped taking it cold turkey I would become too dizzy to even stand up, along with severe nausea and headaches that were decidedly not bearable. But thanks for your anecdote. Maybe actual studies with large numbers could settle this? Oh, wait...

        • Re:

          Getting off Citalopram, I felt nothing. But getting off Bupropion caused me to spend three days in bed hallucinating pulsating colored triangles so vividly I could barely drink water.

          The plural of anecdote is not data.

          People’s bodies and brain chemistry are different.

          • Re: Time for other drugs

            That actually sounds a lot like a migraine aura. An arc of shimmering triangle shapes followed by an explosion of pain and nausea that is debilitating.

            • Re:

              According to the Internet, bupropion decreases the excretion rate of magnesium. So getting off of it could cause a reversal rebound, and of course low magnesium is a primary migraine trigger.

        • Re:

          They have and this is why antidepressants can be prescribed so easily. Actually addictive medicine results in far more paperwork.
          Stopping cold turkey is, by the way, not how antidepressants are supposed to be dropped. Just because I did it this way it doesn't mean everyone should since some people can cope with pain better than others.
          According to the German cilatopram leaflet,

          it should be slowly discontinued at the end of treatment. It is recommended to gradually reduce the dose over a period of at least 1

        • Re:

          Yes, SSRIs shouldn't be quit cold turkey, thank you Captain Obvious, and the guy who prescribed it to you told you that, but you chose to ignore his advice. Nevertheless they are NOT addictive, as in, you don't feel an irresistible compulsion to get another dose. And if you slowly taper them off, like your doctor told you to, there's no problem getting off them.

          • Re:

            Nevertheless they are NOT addictive, as in, you don't feel an irresistible compulsion to get another dose.

            That's one form of addiction, but physical dependence is something else entirely. Regardless of whether it's playing on the reward centers of your brain, if you can't cut it, then there's addiction.

          • Re:

            My prescriber never told me they would have to be tapered. Never mentioned anything about withdrawl.

    • Seconded. My GP wouldn’t prescribe Wellbutrin until everything else he could try had been tried, since dependence was so bad.

      I can’t remember what it was that I was on, but it had me hallucinating music or not-quite-audible talk radio whenever there was silence. I was instructed to crash off it, not taper (I was at the minimum dose anyway) and after about a very apprehensive week, I spent three days in bed, drenched with flop sweats, consuming only water and vividly hallucinating throbbing searing-bright triangles with all my senses. It took more than three days to be “okay” but it was three days before I could consume anything but water, because it took a supreme effort of will to shuffle to the bathroom, fill and drain a glass, and take a leak because of the sensory overload inflicted upon me by withdrawal symptoms.

      My mother is on something which I fucking hope ain’t scheduled, because if she doesn’t carry out a VERY careful and gentle taper, it will trigger a massive heart attack.

      Drug cessation needs to be carried out under controlled circumstances for anything more interesting than Tylenol. I was going to use Advil as my example because that’s less toxic than Tylenol, but that has serious implications when combined with blood thinners or Aspirin, so no, even that has to be managed carefully too, in some subset of patients.

    • • Re:

        Buproprion was one that my GP was hesitant to prescribe because the withdrawals sucked in everyone he tried to taper off the stuff, and most people he tried to get off it simply had to go on a low maintenance dose indefinitely.

        • Re:

          Did you use the extended release version? Also what dosage? Because this is weird, I know several people who did take it, myself included, and this is my favourite antidepressant of all because the only side effect was jaw clenching and there were zero withdrawal whether taking it for several years or going on and off every couple of weeks.

      • Re:

        There's a difference between "habit forming" and addictive. Paxil isn't considered habit forming, but if you don't taper and go cold turkey instead, you're in for a really bad time

      • Bullshit Zoloft is non addictive. Go cold turkey from it and tell me how you feel in a few days when every time you look around you brain gets zapped and studders.

        • Re:

          Withdrawal symptoms does not mean addictive. Addiction requires drug-seeking behavior like robbing pharmacies. Nobody robs a pharmacy to get Zoloft. The discontinuation sucks and going cold-turkey makes no sense, but it's still not addictive.

    • • Re:

        Which is physiological addiction. Your body is addicted to the effect. There's just no instant response for your body to associate that effect with an action such as taking an SSRI since there's no instant response.

      • Re:

        Discontinuation syndrome. Do you work for a drug company? That's drug company speak for when a med is addictive but they don't want it labelled addictive.

    • • Re:

        I've had Paxil too, nasty withdraw in less than a day after a missed dose.

  • Re:

    Anti depressants do work and are not that addictive.

    Those of us with treatment-resistant depression might beg to differ. Staying in your own lane of competence regarding medical issues is an art YOU may have to master.

    • Re:

      Does not sound like you have the wherewithal, and your doctors may be incentivized to keep you believing you are so afflicted. Maybe it is time we give therapy and in bad cases, commitment to a mental facility for treatment. We have drastically reduced mental institution use, and I am starting to think we overshot the mark on how much we should use of these treatments. Medication is not always the answer.

      • How about we leave the medical decisions to the doctors and patients involved?

      • If a pill a day keeps the asylum away, I think the pill is probably a winner.

        Having said that, you should look into the difficulties of treatment resistant depression. You can’t just check into rehab for some therapy and leave in a month. First off, American health care. You wouldn’t have insurance the moment you needed to use it, for starters! Because a month or two of inpatient treatment will get your ass fired from most jobs. And if you’ve got the rare boss that respects FMLA, wellthat’s still a couple months of unpaid leave, and the average American can’t make an unexpected $400 payment.

        But to end on a note of hope, ketamine is beginning to look more and more like a one-and-done cure for many cases of depression, and for those who aren’t completely cured they’re often left with permanently improved symptoms. Likewise, psychedelics combined with talk therapy seem to make permanent inroads into curing or reducing symptoms of depression, PTSD, phobias, and anxiety. So one day, a few rounds of intensive therapy may be the one-and-done cure you’re implying should be available to all.

        And frankly it should be, fuck Nixon and his war on drugs.

      • Re:

        That is literally depression.

    • Re: Time for other drugs

      There are indeed a lot of lanes here.

  • Re:

    Antidepressants are extremely addictive, the worst withdrawal I've ever felt.

    • • Re:

        You’re being pedantic, and I suspect you know it.

        People can easily become dependent on SSRIs and suffer withdrawals with a poorly managed discontinuation.

        • Re: Time for other drugs

          Big difference is tollerance. You need to gradually increase the dose to get the same effect with i.e. benzos.

      • Re:

        Dependence is physical addiction.

  • Re:

    There are other drugs to deal with these things. Anti depressants do work and are not that addictive.

    The other drugs are only adequate in some cases and being used when they are sufficient.

    If other options would suffice, or the patient's prognosis if Not using a drug wasn't more severe than expected side effects, then they would be prescribing these. Prescription opioids are a last resort, but still very necessary.

    • Re:

      No they're not, haven't you seen the studies where they compare negligible doses of opioids to liver and kidney killing levels of NSAIDs, and concluded that the latter is just as effective at very slightly reducing the level of pain you're in, e.g. taking a 8 down to a 6, making the former uneeded?? Oh and don't forget side effects like opioid-induced hyperalgesia being common instead of rare, nevermind the actual numbers.
      /s, if that wasn't clear. Those studies are a joke, but people are trotting them out

  • Re:

    Neither Xanax nor Adderall are anti-depressants. They are effective treatments for unrelated disorders but also prone to abuse.

    Preventing people who are not abusing anything from filling legitimate prescriptions by artificially restricting supply to retailers is not a solution, it's a new problem we didn't need.

  • Re:

    Anti depressants do not work for everyone, and you are not supposed to go off of any of them suddenly, in many cases even if they are not working for you.

    • Re:

      I went off one suddenly on medical advice, because shortly after starting it I had begun to hallucinate music.

      It was medically necessary, but it was also one of the most unpleasant experiences of my life. Three days without sleep, in bed, flop sweats, unable to eat, while I vividly hallucinated throbbing technicolor triangles. Not just with my eyes. Full fucking synesthesia. Kept going for most of a week, but I could sleep on the fourth night.

      I agree with you, but I don’t think you’re really do

  • Stuff like SSRI may technically not be addictive in the sense of getting you high and creating the psychological kind of addiction where you crave those high dopamine levels and start believing that you can no longer live without it.
    But from what I've heard from people who are taking them and stopped for whatever reason (side effects can reduce quality of life a lot), they do can have some severe withdrawal symptoms.
    Turns out that brain chemistry is complex and that there's no one-fits-all type of medication for everything. Effective therapy often has to be determined on an individual basis.
    
    Also I'm not sure what alternative drugs there are other than stimulants for people with severe concentration problems due to ADHD for example.
    In these cases, stimulants like amphetamines or methylphenidate (both of which can get you high if taken in large enough doses and are therefore abused recreationally as well) are the only known treatment to be effective there.
    
    
    Maybe in the future something will be found, and we should certainly be keeping an open mind for effective treatments and follow the evidence, but for now such limits imposed on pharmacies do not seem like a sensible idea.

    • Re:

      This is correct. Just because something isn't addictive doesn't mean that suddenly stopping wont' have effects. This is true even for things with no psychological effects such as blood pressure medicine.

  • Re:

    Why the hell is this marked "troll?" I'm on antidepressants and it's absolutely correct. Using them instead of addictive substances: Correct. Slow to kick in: Some of them, not all. Suffering is something to master: Hell don't I know it.

    It's a little off-topic, but antidepressants can absolutely be used to treat anxiety, and addictive stimulants are a bad way to beat chronic fatigue or depression.

    The mods must be crazy.

    • Re: Time for other drugs

      Myeah, I get it. It was a comment that would make a lot of people angry and react. Also it does not apply to everyone so was a bit too crude. In some cases, there is little choice. But of course everyone on xanax believes this applies to them.
      Then I mentioned suffering, which is a very uncomfortable topic. Makes us all nervous, while it is a part of everyone's life.
      Did post the comment since I have some experience in the field as a patient. Confrontation should not be avoided. Also posted the comment si

  • Re:

  • • • Anxiety disorders can't be dealt with by talking therapy and can't be just "dealt with". The difference between regular anxiety and a disorder is that, with a disorder, it's totally paralyzing, highly persistent, and has no external cause. It's due to brain chemistry and brain wiring. Only by changing the chemistry can you get rid of such disorders. Self-medication, often with alcohol, is the only viable alternative to drugs. And it doesn't stay viable for very long.

        • There are plenty of coping mechanisms and cognitive behavioral therapy that works for anxiety, even if it's not a "cure." But medication helps greatly with the process. I don't think you would have the capacity for treatment without the medication.

        • • > Just because Xanax helps your anxiety doesn't mean your anxiety is caused by "chemical imbalance",

            Uh, you're completely wrong. Sometimes. The problem with anxiety disorders is that there is no "root cause." Everyday things that most people ignore cause huge amounts of anxiety in some people because their neurological biasing is just faulty. No amount of "talk therapy" is going to fix that. It simply can't be rationalized away.

            As an amusing example, I suggest you find your local meth addict going through a paranoid delusional episode and try and "talk" them out of it. The effects of neurological biasing will become quite obvious. You can try it with drunks too. Equally ineffective.

            Yes, these are extreme examples and the biasing agents are external. Know what? THAT DOESN"T MATTER. Neurochemistry doesn't care about source.

            • I am personally caught in the middle of this. I have a brain tumor on my pituitary gland, causing it to not secrete chemicals itâ(TM)s supposed to. Because of that, my hormones are all out of wack and can only manage via injections. Yet, I have been unable to get my testosterone or hydrocortisone. Instead itâ(TM)s a game of: try back later, and if you can find another pharmacy who has them, let us know and we can transfer the prescription.

              • Re: Here you go again, pooh-poohing the problem!

                This probably explains why it has been such a pain in the ass for me to get Adderall filled. The pharmacist told me that it was due to a national shortage, which never really made any sense to me. I've been prescribed that to manage ASD.

          • Re:

            "Aspirin insufficiency" is some funny shit. I'm going to remember that one and use it as often as possible.

          • Re:

            Your view on this seems wrong. Anxiety and depression are known to have, as one set of causes hyper- and hypothyroidism respectively. So, how will talk therapy fix that as opposed to treating the thyroid condition? The thyroid condition could be caused by cancer. Does talk therapy cure cancer? What you're doing here sounds like one of those pathological rants about diabetes being the domain of slothful, obese people whose condition is essentially a moral punishment for their failure to be decent people.

          • As a medic I was trained to reassure the patient, because one of the problems with someone undergoing trauma is that panic can induce shock, which greatly complicates treatment. But the fact that I "talk someone down" and the fact that this can prevent a bad situation from getting worse, does not mean the underlying problem is not medical in nature.

            It is irritating to deal with people who believe that because talking about something made them feel better, that it will make everyone feel better. It's like saying that someone with a fever can't have Covid because you had a fever when you had the flu. Such large generalizations are not helpful and do not help those who have a legitimate, albeit poorly understood, medical condition.

      • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 04, 2023 @07:29AM (#63424520)

        Maybe this is a good thing. We are disgustingly, outrageously overmedicated. We need to get back to talking through, rationalizing away, and dealing with our suffering. Not every bad feeling in your brain has to be medicated away with psychotropics. It's absurd how many people rely on these drugs

        No, this is NOT a good thing. Not even close.

        Everything you said following those first words is completely true, is decidedly a problem, and unarguably needs solutions.
        However denying the people who do need medications, for real and physical problems, conditions completely unrelated to psychotherapy, is NOT an answer and NOT a good thing!

        Just because two example drugs get tossed into the story title should not be read as the only problem.
        These are just two more examples in a very long list of casualties resulting from this massive overreach.

        You point out "dealing with our suffering", yet this solution really is only trading one kind of suffering for another, in a (likely vein) attempt to change who suffers.

        Yea, I'm sorry people that got addicted to opioids are suffering from that, and yea I know not everyone in that situation is at fault for it.
        All this "solution" is doing however is causing pain and suffering in other people with non-opioid related conditions.

        No, I don't have an answer, I never claimed to. Yet inducing new suffering in people who have already found an end to their past pain and suffering can't possibly be viewed as a good thing.

      • We need to stop people from the FDA/CDC/NIH from transitioning into the Pharmaceutical industry after they leave their gov't roles. There's too much of a chance of ignoring serious issues when you're trying to regulate your future employer. I'd even extend that further, federal employees should be able to transition into an industry that they were responsible for regulating.

      • This is called "ableism." You sound like a person outside of the situation trying to dictate or tell somebody within the situation how to deal with it.

        Consider your same explanation, except for somebody who is blind: Just try rationalizing away and dealing with your blindness, you don't need special concessions or even tools.

      • Re: Here you go again, pooh-poohing the problem!

        As someone with Schizoaffective disorder in the US who has run into these issues, it's like cutting someone off diabetes medication. My ex who has Schizophrenia was cut off in the UK similarly and it fucked her up so badly she will likely complete her journey from productive member of society to borderline IRA-like terrorist who will remain in a hospital without meds instead within the year.
        
        Great plan you got there, chief. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest minus meds?

        • Re:

          Then they wonder why funding is a problem when the medications denied are cheaper than the non-medicated results.

          I was just denied a specific and simple medical checkup until they see if the meds I was prescribed fix my problem but the checkup is to see if I have cancer from my pre-medicate state and has nothing to do with the medication which stops the symptoms but doesn't cure prior damage.

          So now I have to play the "wait 8 weeks on new meds then ask again" game because they're dumb and don't understand ba

      • Not every bad feeling in your brain has to be medicated away with psychotropics. It's absurd how many people rely on these drugs.

        Well then, let me instead make an appeal to your "conservative" side: some people need their medications to be able to get through school and/or hold a job.

        We give kids Adderall and Ritalin because counseling and discipline doesn't get them to sit quietly in class and do their work. Yes, if you believe you can restructure society so people can still lead productive lives even if they don't fit within the existing paradigm of education and employment, by all means do so. In all likelihood though, you'll just come back to the conclusion that the drugs are an easier solution.

        • We give kids Adderall and Ritalin because counseling and discipline doesn't get them to sit quietly in class and do their work

          With kids, these medications can help them "grow out" of ADHD - it helps steer brain development back on track. Adults who get diagnosed can manage the condition with the same drugs, but it never gets better.

          I sat quietly in class, so I never got diagnosed as a kid - in fact, not until last year. ADHD is not always outwardly visible - my mind doesn't sit still. It never has, but I always made sure I structured my life so that I had enough free time to "catch up." That worked fine until two kids.

          Does hyperstimulation with electronics cause ADHD? Maybe. But that abnormal brain development is still real/physical.

          But in regards to the post above, brain medication has changed the world. The number of people who used to be locked up in mental institutions who are able to have any semblance of a normal life at all is huge. Some end up in jail or homeless, but it's actually a pretty small number relatively speaking.

          • Re:

            Doctors loved telling people that, and the one about it "correcting a chemical imbalance", too.

            More recent studies have demonstrated that the drugs do not result in an improved aptitude towards learning. [fiu.edu] The drugs certainly do help make kids more manageable for the one-size-fits-most public school system, but they do so by masking the symptoms rather than correcting the underlying issue. Furthermore, even without treatment, some kids grow out of it. [consumerreports.org] Folks with adult ADD/ADHD are unfortunately, the ones w

            • What is it that you think the underlying issue is if it's not the symptoms that are "masked"?

              An improved aptitude toward learning in a traditional school environment is not a good indicator of success, especially if by your own words the school systems are one size fits most.

              As someone who is adult diagnosed and self employed, nobody cares what the drugs do but me. And what it does is make me feel normal - to me, not some predefined societal definition. Reducing my executive dysfunction to levels as it existed before adulthood stress and time constraints eliminated my ability to cope.

        • • Re:

            If you let a kid with ADHD run around until they've worn themselves out, you don't end up with a kid who wants to do their classwork, you just end up with an exhausted kid who is still easily distracted. You've essentially just turned an ADHD kid temporarily into an ADD kid. It actually makes sense once you realize that stimulant medicines wouldn't be of very much use if the problem was actually just an excess of energy.

      • Yeah!

        Get big government out of food inspections and fire codes too. Industries can self regulate, right? It worked just splendid in the past.

• • Re:

    Anything that alters brain chemistry can have a recreational use by those who don't have the initially distorted brain chemistry to begin with or who have discovered recreational drug interactions with other substances.

    Indeed, it's now the recreational drugs that are being looked at to treat things like depression, as noted on Slashdot repeatedly. Angel Dust and Magic Mushrooms being two that are taken very seriously by psychiatrists.

    • Re:

      Indeed, it’s now the recreational drugs that are being looked at to treat things like depression, as noted on Slashdot repeatedly. Angel Dust and Magic Mushrooms being two that are taken very seriously by psychiatrists.

      They were being used in clinical practice with good effect when they were banned by the Nixon administration. They weren’t recreational drugs until they were banned, ffs.

• • Re:

    That was my first reaction, too. If that were the only casualty of the manufactured opioid crisis, I would be fully on board with blocking access to them. However, I suspect that the schools will be the only ones with easy access, and only adults with an actual medical need for them will be stymied.

    • Re:

      However, I suspect that the schools will be the only ones with easy access, and only adults with an actual medical need for them will be stymied.

      Literally my life story.

  • Re:

    But how do you expect them to become upstanding citizens if we don't sedate them the second they dare to want to actually run around and act like kids?