Giving a Damn

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The following article reveals, yet again, what we at the Institute have known for the last 3-4 years.  

Here we again see, supposedly intelligent (at least ‘educated’) self-aware, and clearly product aware people, deliberately seeking out illicit substances, purchasing them with disposable income, not due to the tyranny of addiction, but for a planned and sought after ‘party experience’. 

The awareness of risk and harm is not an issue with this demographic as experimentation is increasing, not decreasing.  The perception of risk is being eroded with every pro-drug liberalizing mantra, every misuse of Harm Reduction mechanism and every other tacit permission given by a ‘wink at drug use’ by the drug-culture gate-keepers and their promoters and permitters.

This entire risk taking, self-intoxicating and law-breaking activity is a calculated process that gives no regard to best health and community practice. ‘Legalizing’ or even ‘testing’ these drugs will have no bearing on this cohort, as they care only for their next hedonic excursion and they are fully convinced (due to much of the above) that the risks in these practices are manageable.

Of course, they are also fully aware that the ‘Nanny-State’ that they decry and so carelessly ‘thumb their nose at’ with utter contempt, will be there for them when their self-indulgence fails them – Nanny-State Ambulance will take them to a Nanny-State hospital, where free Nanny-State health care will attempt to restore them to a semblance of what they once were prior to the self-harm. And, finally, if that doesn’t ‘reboot’ them for the next round of partying, then the Nanny-State will supply the welfare to care for their permanent self-sabotage!

The hypocritical cacophony of all this is as deafening as the cognitive dissonance is breathtaking!

When will the ‘user pay’? It appears never! Social responsibility and accompanying justice cannot come into play because someone else will always pick up the tab – That someone else is inevitably the silent majority of non-drug taking citizens, who are rapidly also becoming the ‘gagged’ victims of this pro-drug cohort and their manipulatively emotive speech codes.

Yet another reason why this conduct, this behaviour needs to remain illegal. Civil Society demands that, even if we don’t care about ourselves, that we must still regard the health, safety, productivity and well-being of those around us – particularly our societies children.

Dalgarno Institute

Multiple substance abuse rife

Young people are increasingly turning to purer forms of party drugs that are stronger and potentially more harmful, a new report on Australian drug trends has revealed.

Findings released on Monday by the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC) show the percentage of people using ecstasy in crystal or capsule form has hit record levels over the past decade.

Ecstasy crystals and capsules often contain a higher purity of the drug, and are reportedly stronger than ecstasy pills, the researchers said

Dr Amy Peacock, program lead for drug trends at NDARC, cautioned that the findings do not represent drug use in the general population but the trends observed in this recent study are a cause for concern.

“Use of higher-purity stimulants can increase the risk of experiencing acute and long-term negative health effects,” Dr Peacock said.

The researchers also found an overwhelming majority of users were combining ecstasy and other stimulants with a cocktail of other drugs, including cannabis and LSD.

“Nine in 10 participants reported the last time that they used an illicit stimulant that they’d also used cannabis, some depressants such as alcohol, they might have used hallucinogens like LSD, or a dissociative [painkillers such as ketamine],” Dr Peacock said.

“That combination of substances can be quite risky in terms of the likelihood of experiencing an adverse health event.”

Ketamine is a prescription medicine that is used by doctors and vets as an anaesthetic or painkiller. Known as ‘K’ or ‘Special K’, the substance is illegally used to induce a trance-like state.

When combined with other substances, especially alcohol or anti-anxiety medicines, the unpredictable drug can affect breathing or stop it altogether.

Cocaine use has also increased to record levels in the past decade, from 23 per cent in 2003 to 59 per cent in 2018.

Another NDARC study sample, involving 910 illicit drug users, found crystal methamphetamine use is also higher in 2018. Half of the survey respondents reported using meth on a weekly or more frequent basis.

Higher purity’ party drugs on the rise among young people

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Young people are increasingly turning to purer forms of party drugs that are stronger and potentially more harmful, a new report on Australian drug trends has revealed.

Findings released on Monday by the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC) show the percentage of people using ecstasy in crystal or capsule form has hit record levels over the past decade.

Ecstasy crystals and capsules often contain a higher purity of the drug, and are reportedly stronger than ecstasy pills, the researchers said

Dr Amy Peacock, program lead for drug trends at NDARC, cautioned that the findings do not represent drug use in the general population but the trends observed in this recent study are a cause for concern.

“Use of higher-purity stimulants can increase the risk of experiencing acute and long-term negative health effects,” Dr Peacock said.

The researchers also found an overwhelming majority of users were combining ecstasy and other stimulants with a cocktail of other drugs, including cannabis and LSD.

“Nine in 10 participants reported the last time that they used an illicit stimulant that they’d also used cannabis, some depressants such as alcohol, they might have used hallucinogens like LSD, or a dissociative [painkillers such as ketamine],” Dr Peacock said.

“That combination of substances can be quite risky in terms of the likelihood of experiencing an adverse health event.”

Ketamine is a prescription medicine that is used by doctors and vets as an anaesthetic or painkiller. Known as ‘K’ or ‘Special K’, the substance is illegally used to induce a trance-like state.

When combined with other substances, especially alcohol or anti-anxiety medicines, the unpredictable drug can affect breathing or stop it altogether.

Cocaine use has also increased to record levels in the past decade, from 23 per cent in 2003 to 59 per cent in 2018.

Another NDARC study sample, involving 910 illicit drug users, found crystal methamphetamine use is also higher in 2018. Half of the survey respondents reported using meth on a weekly or more frequent basis.

Higher purity’ party drugs on the rise among young people

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https://www.amazon.com/Chemical-Slavery-Understanding-Addiction-Stopping/dp/1985750325  

 This extremely ambitious book by Dr. Robert DuPont is the first book that I know of by a leader in the drug abuse prevention and treatment field that has highlighted the message of Pope Francis:  that engaging in drug taking for experiential purposes is tantamount to allowing oneself to become enslaved.  No one would ever willingly accept such a fate. When one gives up one’s will power, the theosophists say that one gives up one’s soul power.  The Dalai Lama has said that a person who uses drugs give up his or her authentic self.  This book provides a range of significant roadmaps that have been used by a country, Sweden; and by institutions, treatment programs, families, and individual drug users and addicts, to safeguard or sustain and retain that authentic drug-free selfhood.  By bringing to light in one place, many of these roadmaps, Dr. DuPont shares insights into how that authentic self can be safeguarded from the pitfalls of drug taking behavior. He shares insights into the steps that many have taken to retain or reclaim their authentic selves, initiative, will power, brain power, judgment, creativity, and essential humanity.

Paula D. Gordon, PhD

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Research studies (see Stoové et al, 2009) have long associated surviving a drug overdose with the increased likelihood of a future non-fatal or fatal drug overdose. In a 2017 Massachusetts study of opioid overdoses, 10% of those who survived died within the next year from a drug overdose or other causes. In one of the most rigorous U.S. follow-up studies, Dr. Mark Olfson and colleagues compared the mortality rates of people who had survived a non-fatal opioid overdose to demographically matched members of the general U.S. population. They found that those who survived an opioid overdose died in the next year at 24 times the mortality rate of those in the general population, with most deaths attributed to drug-related diseases, subsequent overdose, circulatory disease, respiratory disease, cancer, HIV, viral hepatitis, and suicide. In another study that might be christened an investigation into lost opportunities, Dr. Linn Gjersing and colleagues found in a retrospective analysis of people who died of a drug overdose that 61% had previously sought emergency medical care and that 18% were frequent users of emergency medical services. The reasons for seeking past emergency care included somatic complaints (48%), injury (44%), alcohol and other drug-related medical problems (32%), and drug overdose (26%).

For complete article

This is just one of the reasons why it is vital to divert drug users into recovery programs, not simply enable and equip them to continue self-harming with substances – These drug use endorsing mechanisms only increase the risk of harm that the same so-called ‘harm reduction’ strategies are supposed to lessen! (D.I. Comment)