The big question remains. Why do so many Americans wish to nullify their lives? Before physical addiction occurs, users make the choice to start using opiods. Surely, few of them are unaware of the danger. The high is just too enticing.
Once addicted, it is difficult for most users to kick the habit. Drugs and counseling can help, but many would rather have the high and suffer the consequences. Why?
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Because they live in a society that has lost all civility. That's why abuse is so much higher here than elsewhere.
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@Boston Barry Your "big question" is somewhat ahistorica and inaccurate. Many, many people who have taken opioids both legally and illegally -- indeed, the majority -- do not become addicted. Those who do become addicted differ from those who don't across a complex of variables that include genetic predisposition, family, community and neighborhood circumstances and norms, etc.
Do you not know that a huge proportion of the victims of the current opioid epidemic, especially the "naive young," began their journey to addiction after their clinicians prescribed them opioids? This very periodical two days ago ran a story on how Insys was fined nearly $1/4 billion for fraudulently marketing the very powerful and deadly opioid fentanyl to clinicians?
Why do people start? Because their circumstances and calculi are not the same as yours.
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"In a soft voice, the doctor, George O’Neil, pleaded with the man to continue to the next stage: an implant of the drug naltrexone, a device that the physician himself had invented"
So, George owns the company (no pesky shareholders like these US companies), is inventor and maker of the implant, is the physician paid to administrate the implant and is pleading with vulnerable patients to take his own unapproved implant. I bet he tries to 'win' with every patient. And his implant is .better. than BioCorRx- you ask him- and he will tell you... as he tries to destroy his competitor and label them as less effective. How did NYT publish something this speculative, biased and one-sided? BioCorRx is not even given an opportunity to respond.
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There is nothing in the story indicating Dr. O'Neil has actually done formal studies on the efficacy of his treatment. Essentially all his evidence is anecdotal.
It's worth noting that methadone and buprenorphine are extremely cheap medications and the treatment described in the article costs about $4800. The article says that this cost includes "counseling" but makes no mention of what this consists of or for how long it lasts.
I fear this treatment is simply another way someone is looking to make a buck out of the opioid epidemic. As a pain management physician, I have seen multiple schemes doctors have created over the years such as rapid detoxification that have been sold as a simple, easy way to get people off opioids.
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Naltrexone implants have been available in the United States in NJ for at least the last 20 years. A Dr. Gooberman in Cherry Hill, NJ used to do the implants, I’m not sure if he still does or not but this is nothing new. One of the problems patients would run into is the craving to get high was so forceful for some that they would cut their own implant out to get high. Addiction is a terrible thing and people will go to extremes to get high sometimes, even if it means cutting an implant out. There was also some controversy years ago about a rapid detox program before implantation where someone died, I’m not sure of all the specifics but I’m sure it can be found online. This procedure may work for some but the science is already there that supports medication assisted therapy like methodone and suboxone/subutex. I don’t think these other avenues of getting clean should be discounted just yet, even though they seem to be stigmatized with the general public. As for the comment about walking past a methodone clinic and seeing people high, one, you don’t know where in recovery the people you are seeing are at, it could be their first day. Two, as with most medications, there is an adjustment period and it takes time to get a patients dose correct as the same dose does not work appropriately for all people. The side effects dissipate with time. If all three methods work for different people, then this is wonderful news, more lives saved.
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The illustration is not of test tubes but volumetric flasks
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It has been well researched that cannabis works exceptionally well at treating opioid addiction. Cannabis that can be grown for free, by anyone, if only governments would stop making it illegal. But then what would all the drug manufacturers do? They’d lose their biggest source of income - drug addicts that they created.
If you don’t understand the medical benefits of cannabis, please don’t start regaling me with ‘gateway drug’ etc. all of which has been disproved. Cannabis has been around for thousands and thousands of years and has been used as medicine all over the world, including the USA, from prehistory right up until Anslinger decided to promote his racist agenda and round up the black people and Mexicans after alcohol prohibition was lifted.
There are many countries currently involved with Cannabis research with Israel leading the way.
We have already have a viable free solution to this terrible epidemic. Let’s stop funneling money to big pharma.
It’s criminal that we can solve this terrible problem for free, and yet we refuse to.
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@Laurel S
do you want to cite some of that great research on cannabis for opioid addiction. I mean actual double blind controlled studies not anecdotal ones.
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The frequency of photos of unclothed women in medical-related articles, as compared to men, strikes me as another form of exploiting women. Why not show the boyfriend unclothed during his surgery that followed hers?
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@Elizabeth I found the photo not exploitative but informative and repulsive, and it wouldn't have made a whit of difference to my mental sensibilities if a male abdomen had been portrayed.
Both sexes have abdomens, you know..
Frankly, I think you are too enamored of sex-based ideological warfare, and look for it everywhere you can.
It's nothing to do with this story, that's for sure.
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His altruism appears to have begun fading fast now that real money is going to be involved.
He clearly wants to be famous and very, very rich.
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I take naltrexone daily for alcoholism, and it's allowed me to function as a normal human being for the first time in my life - I now drink socially with absolutely no desire to overindulge. I haven't had more than two drinks in an evening in four years, and frequently go months without a single one. I don't even think about it anymore, the alcoholism is just...gone. It's a Pinocchio pill - it turns you from a puppet to alcohol into a real person.
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So the pharmaceutical industry is going to save us from the pharmaceutical industry?
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May I suggest instead of using the term ‘addicts’ you use less stigmatising language instead such as ‘people with a substance use issue’. Language can perpetuate negative stereotypes and as journalists / writers there is power to change that.
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I'd be curious to know how much the BioCorRx will charge for their product. I can bet that it will be substantially higher than Dr. Neil's treatment. I pray that Dr. Neil can get his approved before they do. Big Pharma is just despicable!
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If the 3 main therapies are equally effective and safe Offer addicts a choice.
They can receive naloxone or the Methadone or the Suboxone, but whatever the total cost is (including medication device dispensary) they pay the difference between the cheapest and the most expensive. The methadone and suboxone cost a lot to dispense - typical methadone clinic has at least 3 employees rent urine screening tests. And no matter how many articles tell us methadone does not cause a high, a walk by any methadone clinic will inform you otherwise.
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This is not all together new. This has an upside, but it has down sides as well. I don't know the exact details of how the device works, but I know what naltrexone is. I was given the option of having naltrexone injections.I declined. My problem with it is when you are someone taking this, and have a terrible accident or are in extreme pain, if you are given pain medication the naltrexone gives you instant withdrawal symptoms. Of course, one hopefully won't have this happen. Unfortunately, this exact thing occurred with me. I had a 9mm kidney stone (which is very large), and it is the worst pain I have ever been in. I wasn't on Naltrexone. If I had been, well, I don't want to imagine it. So the bottom line (for me) is, it is up to each individual case.
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@Easy Goer
"...someone taking this, and have a terrible accident or are in extreme pain, if you are given pain medication the naltrexone gives you instant withdrawal symptoms."
This is Not at all what would happen to someone on naltrexone who received opiods. What would happen is that the opiods would be less effective, or perhaps not effective at all. This is because the naltrexone simply blocks the receptor site.
If you were in need of treatment for pain, a practitioner would simply prescribe you a pain medication that is not an opiod. We do this regularly at the hospital where I work.
Only if you are alreday on opiods and then you take naltrexone will you immediately feel the symptoms of withdrawl. That is why it is suggested that patients begin naltrexone after stopping opiods.
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@Easy Goer
"fiatrn" is correct. As an Addiction Medicine Specialist I hear the "what if I have a bad accident" line on a daily basis. That's the fear that pain meds won't work (not fear of withdrawal) with Naltrexone on board. My counter to that argument is two-fold: First, the chances of relapse and fatal overdose are much higher than the chances of catastrophic accident. Second, as "fiatrn" stated there are other types of analgesia such as non-opioid medications and regional pain blocks about which anesthesiologists are very familiar. Also, it's definitely possible to override the opiate receptor blockade with large doses of potent opioids such as Fentanyl in a controlled setting such as the ER or OR where a patient can be monitored closely and their airway protected. Unfortunately, people on the street who have Naltrexone in their system (tab or inj) have found that they can override it with Fentanyl and are dying from ODs. So the Naltrexone tablet, injection, or implantable device themselves are not going to prevent using and OD deaths. If a person is minimally invested their recovery/sobriety, no drug (Suboxone, Methadone, or Naltrexone) will obviate the possibility of OD and death. As Bill and Bob, the founders of AA said, this disease of addiction is truly cunning, baffling and powerful. As an addict in recovery myself, I doubt that there will ever be one pill or one method that'll cure this disease. By definition it's chronic, but definitely can be controlled.
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While having a device that delivers the opioid antagonist for several months is attractive, let's not overlook the already existing and available naltrexone depot (injection), which will prevent the action of most opiates, including heroin, for 30 days. The main downside is the expense, and the spotty coverage of this form of naltrexone by some health insurers. The 30 day interval however also has a significant upside: it allows for a built-in follow up, and the treating health care professional knows something is amiss if the patient doesn't show for his or her shot. That being said, the more ways to treat opiate addiction, the better.
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@Pete in Downtown could do the injections first then then implant. Maybe two injections, then implant.
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