OPINION: It’s time we stop scapegoating Vicodin over America’s heroin problem
Heroin tainted with fentanyl is the culprit, not prescription opioids
Over-prescribing opioids gave rise to this problem, but now they may be needed to solve it. Graphic by Kayla Brown
November 25, 2019
The conversation about the opioid crisis is all wrong.
At the most recent Democratic primary debate, we learned that most if not all of the candidates want to reduce the amount of opioid prescriptions and punish Big Pharma. I appreciate the sentiment behind that stance, but that doesn’t help the people addicted to opioids.
My solution is simple – let doctors establish contracts with addicted patients to provide them with opioid prescriptions, transition them into an addiction treatment drug such as Suboxone and get them off once and for all.
Making prescription opioids largely unavailable leaves people with opioid addiction in a terrible dilemma, either enter a nightmarish withdrawal or buy heroin – likely tainted with fentanyl.
Not to mention the reduced accessibility to opioid prescriptions punishes chronic pain patients. CBD (cannabidiol) is not a pain killer and it’s tiring to hear it suggested as a viable replacement.
I like Senator Warren’s proposed CARE Act, but even her $100 billion plan doesn’t get to the root of the problem. It’s also outrageously expensive.
An ideal plan would provide addicted patients with immediate access to help through their primary care doctors. They would be allowed up to one year of prescription opioids at a dose that is right for their needs before being transitioned onto, and eventually off of, Suboxone.
Only patients who meet specific criteria proving their dependency should be allowed into such a program and monthly check-ups should be required. Any indication that the prescription is being misused or sold should result in a termination of the patient’s contract.
Prescription opioids are relatively cheap until they reach the black market, where prices are only going up. People with opioid addictions who can no longer afford the habit are turning to heroin.
If they were able to access what they need cheaply and under medical supervision, there would be virtually no market for heroin. Opioid users would be free to spend their time productively instead of scrounging for extra cash – often by illegal means that negatively affect others.
As addicted patients’ lives slowly improve, it will be easier for them to get a grip on their condition.
Opioid prescriptions may have ignited the crisis at hand, but they are now needed to solve it. Forcing vulnerable people to turn to heroin (fentanyl) is unconscionable.
According to the Reason Foundation, 75 percent of opioid overdose deaths in 2017 were caused by heroin or fentanyl, not prescriptions.
It’s time we stop scapegoating Vicodin over America’s heroin problem.
Overdose deaths are still climbing despite efforts to keep opioids off the streets. Cutting supply does not eliminate demand for recession-proof products like drugs.
I commend the local governments of Cleveland and Akron for punishing the pharmaceutical companies that contributed to the crisis in their communities, but this is a small victory.
In 2017, 82 percent of Ohio opioid overdoses involved fentanyl. Politicians are fighting this problem from the wrong angle. We need to focus on keeping people off heroin by any means necessary – even if it temporarily means more prescription opioids.
Over-prescribing opioids was a problem that gave rise to the current epidemic, but under-prescribing them seems to be the new problem. Attacking the supply before helping those affected is just another war on drugs.
If we’re going to help people with opioid addictions, we can’t isolate them. We can’t make heroin their only option until they have the means and will to get clean. We can give them the means and help them find the will.
Rehab should not be the only option for addiction treatment. Slightly increasing access to it is a weak policy. There needs to be a frontline treatment that is cheaper and abundantly available.
I’d like to see presidential candidates and others discuss harm reduction policy more often and in greater detail. Until then, I don’t expect this crisis to improve anytime soon.
Forgotten America • Dec 21, 2019 at 9:27 pm
The conversation on the opioid crisis is indeed all wrong and as long as articles like this are posted so will be the approach to actually solving the “opioid crisis”. The so called answer transition addicts to the kolodney cocktail “suboxone” take a opioid replace it with a opioid then we remove the other opioid sending addict home to streets full of fentanyl laced heroin with no more willpower or understanding of issues expecting it to resolve itself. I knew a heroin user who traded all suboxone for her heroin except what she used to pass the tests to receive the suboxone to then again barter for heroin.
Making prescription harder to come by doesn’t just affect addicts like you write, addicts have more choices now then ever due to this they have greater access to more dope than ever before in history and it’s a whole lot more potent now again due to this. Pain was the condition exploited to make money and caused this crisis to begin with now there is no money involved with treating pain and the risk for doctors is far greater now the money-making has turned now to treating people with drugs to get them off of the drugs they were making money treating them with. I sincerely doubt that giving a addict super vised drug using will curb the opioid crisis legalizing marijuana has not dropped marijuana use legalizing marijuana in various States has not stopped the black market.
Forcing vulnerable people to turn to street drugs is inconceivable as you say but it’s inconceivable for more than just drug addicts it’s happening to more than just drug addicts you conveniently left out the chronic pain patients so many of which including myself have been hung out to dry with the knee-jerk reactions to this opioid crisis causing more crisis within it. A large percentage of chronic pain patients including veterans have been all but forgotten about force tapered against CDC guidelines and left with three choices 1 live the rest of your life tortured needlessly suffering in complete misery 2 turn to the plentiful supply of now more potent street drugs 3 commits suicide. I find myself in the first category thinking more about the third category by far then the second category. I lost a best friend who was suffering in chronic pain not being taken seriously by doctors he put a knife in his heart. We have patients that were extremely stable for years including myself forced tapered off of these medications either completely or two such a low ineffective dose forcing us completely off of the medications leaving innocent bystanders like myself in this opioid War all but bedridden and chair bound suffering needlessly in pain. We have veterans walking into medical centers shooting doctors and or shooting themselves killing themselves while sitting on top of their medical records yet I’m sure I’ll read an article this week based on the confusion as to why this is happening. You stayed in your article that politicians are going the wrong way about this do you think it is at all possible that the media is also going the wrong way about this that it might be possible the media is actually making this worse rather than better? We’ve read your article and we’ve read the comments by multiple people under your article what does reading the comments of the people like myself who are smack dab right in the middle of this opioid crisis tell us?
Deborah withrow • Nov 29, 2019 at 10:55 am
First of all this is about patients sufferingwith pain! An addict chooses to take drugs irresponsibly! Theywill take anything! They need treatment! Cpp and intractable pain is horrendous! I have intractable pain and cant get treated for palliative care! I suffer everyday! Enough is enough! We need to go after the hunan rights issue and get the DEA out of medicine! The doctors do what their facility mandates! So many doctors care! But their hands are tied! I have no quality of life!
Yes ive had suicide ideations but i could never do that to my family! The Dea needs to drip the ball and stop the illicit fentynl from coming into our country! Stop persecuting the hurting human in the usa and canada! This has become so ridiculous our country had lost its focus! Its time to sue for our human right to be treated for pain and our disability! Im filing a complaint against the DEA.. if everyone bans together and follows suite maybe just maybe we will get the respect we deserve!
LuLu • Nov 27, 2019 at 8:26 pm
Mitzi, WTH? So uncool, Mitzi! Lately I’ve heard of so many people suffering because doctors and hospitals are so scared to prescribe pain medications. Let’s see, the 85 year old woman who broke her pelvis and was sent home with Tylenol 3!! The young girl who had to go the E.R. over the weekend with an abscessed tooth crying in pain was sent home with six 5 mg. hydrocodone. Anyone ever had an abscessed tooth? Well, I can tell you that 5 mg. of any pain medication is not going to touch that kind of pain. Enough, it’s like we’re living in the 1800’s. We all know there were doctors who were over-prescribing cocktails of dangerous drugs to fakers, to young people,…the pill mills, etc..but all this is in the past, pill mills have been shut down and no one gets prescribed benzos with pain medications anymore, it’s a dangerous combination but the addicts loved it. Drug addicts or those seeking to nod out and get wasted paid cash money to these pill mills and were prescribed anything they wanted. Young people who were no way in any kind of chronic pain were getting these strong opioids and then passing them on to their friends or selling them to friends and they became addicted and then turned to heroin on the streets. Whatever, all I know is that if someone is suffering in serious pain they should NOT be denied medications, they should NOT be looked down upon because they are in pain! If someone has the tests to prove why they have pain they should not be denied. Stop with the generalizations for everyone.
Shirley Jean • Nov 26, 2019 at 10:40 pm
Mitzie you are way off the mark, opioids do in fact work great with Chronic Pain! I had been on Darvocet for years and then Percocet or Hydrocodone. When I needed my pain meds I would use it if I was having low pain days I didn’t! With today’s contracts and bs added that’s hard to do anymore because they want you to take it regularly! Shouldn’t be made to take them on our random good days, that’s wrong!!
I have never had an issue with withdrawal from not taking them…
Concerning addicts, I agree! They need safe drugs and lots of help! Help rebuilding their lives, find out why they are using! There is some speculation concerning some of the addicts using because of pain, they are in physical pain and many with emotional pain. They need counseling too and systems to help get their lives back in order.
I disagree with the use of Suboxone, Subutex or Methadone all of them have a wicked withdrawals! Plus Suboxone is being used on the streets when they are making Meth!! Kratom is something to look into when someone is being weaned off Suboxone or Heroin! I have heard many people say it is the one thing that got them through having their pain medications cut drastically or cold turkey!!
Please always remember the pain patients are suffering and dying in mass!!
Donna Moore-Piland • Nov 26, 2019 at 9:33 pm
I almost forgot to mention that Suboxone is an opioid. It was intended for pain but the FDA wouldn’t approve it for pain. It became an addiction management drug and was hailed as the cure for heroin addiction in its early years. It has all the same drawbacks as traditional pain medications, dependence, overdose, and it is abused the same as pain medications.
It also carries a few adverse side-effects of it’s own and heroin addicts have said its harder to quit than heroin, but I have no interest in dictating to others what meds they may or may not take as prescribed by their doctor.
I only ask the same level of respect from those out to battle addiction. I don’t get a high off my pain meds, so going on Suboxone would serve absolutely no purpose medically. Why should I and millions of other pain patients be forced to take this bogus, less effective, “addiction proof” drug when many of us have taken pain meds for many years without becoming addicted? Intractable pain patients are being left to twist in the wind, all so others can “feel better” about the meds we choose to take. CPPs need law-enforcement and the media to get out of our doctor’s offices and let our doctors care for us without living in fear. What other group of patients is treated so badly?
Donna Moore-Piland • Nov 26, 2019 at 9:20 pm
This writer means well but needs to understand the difference between dependence on a needed medication and addiction. Not everyone who takes “opioids” becomes addicted. The CDC, no fan of pain meds, says that about 6% of pain patients prescribed pain easing opioids become addicted. Addiction is a disease of compulsion. Addicts cannot resist their desire to reach a high so they usee a lot of pain medication or turn to street drugs. There are millions of people who have intractable chronic pain, for life, and they need these medications to be able to have the mobility to be part of the world around them.
Dependency is not a bad thing, especially is the alternative is to be crippled and house or bed-bound, unable to be part of the world. Dependence only means you need to slowly wean off the meds if you stop taking them. The same is true of blood pressure medications, anti-depressants, insulin, and many other drugs that cause patients to develop a dependence.
I ask you to please research the difference between addiction and dependence before you write another article like this because this article wrongly portrays pain patients as “addicted.” CPPs don’t deserve that sort of stigma anymore than addicts do.
Nancy Heiser • Nov 26, 2019 at 5:49 pm
It breaks my heart to hear about the thousands who have died from the “heroin crisis”. I call it this because essentially that’s what happened. Mixing the heroin with easy to obtain fentanyl is the largest cause by far. Bringing opioids into the mix made it worse but was not the major cause. That lie was started by a handful of people who convinced the CDC that American doctors needed written guidelines and all hell broke loose. Pain patients were mistreated by having their meds cut. Now we have a suicide crisis. And people like me with excruciating nerve pain have no life. We cannot function effecting thousands and thousands of spouses, children, mothers, fathers and others. And now the Pain Patients are being ostracized, criticized while we lay in bed, suffering and wondering if life is worth it, anymore. Unless you are suffering horrible pain your blame and criticism is not necessary and extremely hurtful.
Allison • Nov 26, 2019 at 4:14 pm
OMG… Mitzie… What an IDIOT… Sure like you to Experience… Scale 10 PAIN Daily..Day in and Day out.. Loose your Job, Can’t function. .. The only way you can walk across the Room is if you have some RElief… from a Pain Medication.. YA GO TRY AN ASPIRIN.. SAY’S ROBER WILLKIE OF THE VETERAN’S ADM… THAT’S WHY VET’S ARE COMMITTING SUICIDE AT ABOUT 20 PRE DAY… PAIN IS REAL.. AND THE DEA.. KNOWS THIS . THIS CRISIS.. WAS EXCELERATED ” BY THE DEA, CDC.. TRUMP GAVE THEM 1.8 BILLION TO COMBAT THIS CRISIS… AND LOOK WHAT THEY DID… TRUMP GOT THE ‘ GOVERNMENT ” ON THE DOCTOR’S BACK.. AND LOOK MILLIOIN’S ARE SUFFERING IN TORMENTING PAIN…… TO SAY YOU NEED AN ACUPUNCTURE, OR.. ASPIRIN.. THAT’S A COP OUT .. SOO CONCLUSION… DEA, CDC, FDA AND THE TRUMP ADMIN….. THEY HAVE NOO. CONSCIENCE. !!! OUR BLOOD IS ON THEIR HANDS.
Debi Bohannan • Nov 26, 2019 at 4:09 pm
Fifty years of a failed drug war policy tells us we should try a different approach. I strongly urge policy makers to consider human nature & approach the drug issue with consideration of the best way to respond to it. Prohibition has never & will never work, because it ignores human nature.
The latest approach is classic ‘sky is falling’ hysteria. It’s killing people both legal & illicit users. Leaving the greatest nation on earth untreated for pain is NOT the answer.
Cynthia Crosby • Nov 26, 2019 at 4:08 pm
I just want to be able to get back out of my wheelchair and take my dog walking. I can’t because my medication has been so far cutback that my life consists of getting up out of bed from a night of not sleeping to my wheelchair back to my bed. To the person who says chronic pain patients don’t need this medication doesn’t have to live like we do everyday to the end of our lives. We won’t get better just worse. I’m so heartbroken over all parents who have to live with the lost of a child because they were prescribed a opiate and then never weaned off and turned to heroin. But for those of us who won’t get better need this medication. We take responsibility and do as our physicians tell us to do. Take drug screenings, etc. We just want a better quality of life for as long as we are alive. We will never come off this medication and how dare someone say we should all be off if it unless we have cancer. How heartless and uncompassionate can you be. Our lives mean something. I live in so much pain because a doctor failed at his job and now the government is telling me I can’t live my life with the only medication that works for me because people are dying of heroin and fentanyl overdose. Most addicts are addicts because of they way the parents raised them without love, or abuse. Unloved children find whatever they can to escape that life of loneliness until someone shows them they are worthy of being loved and need to live. This starts in the home when your children are little and ones that are prescribed a opiate for a sprain ankle should be weaned off or take Tylenol. But for people living with chronic pain that effects every part of their lives should not be punished to suffer to the point of wanting to end their lives because it’s better than the alternative. It is so sad that we aren’t seen as a person a medical patient needing a doctor to help us, show compassion. We are not an addict abusing our medication.
Debbie D. • Nov 26, 2019 at 4:06 pm
I want to say to all who buy into the BS that opiates don’t help chronic long term pain … you better hope & pray that you never have to find out. They’re not even treating severe acute cancer hospice & surgery pain now.
The truth is that opiates do help with long term chronic pain & it doesn’t make you a addict regardless of what you might have read or researched. This has nothing to do with addiction and everything to do with abandonment of pain treatment
Aaron Anthony • Nov 26, 2019 at 3:56 pm
Opiates absolutely work for chronic pain. Having a collapsed spine or a cage around your neck, severe scoliosis, or SI joint dysfunction is quite visible and yes, when medicine is not used, it hurts. Kinda like getting depressed when discontinuing…antidepressants. Get hit by a bus, get wounded in combat, or have a chronic disease, take 4 ibuprofen, Then get back to us.
Cindy • Nov 26, 2019 at 3:31 pm
We may need to stop and listen, to a wide variety of people to understand what is happening. Our society is often based on the norms of the many without regard for the few. Alcohol is an accepted norm much as smoking was in the past.
Today many people have mental health issues without supports. Others have trouble with gambling. I think we need to provide supportive environments with zero wait times. Eye care, dental care, cancer care, disease care, foot care, pain care and home care with palliative care must be available to all.
Honestly we need care.
Charles Walsh • Nov 26, 2019 at 3:04 pm
There are at least 20 million people who lived with their intractable pain for years before being prescribed opioids for this chronic condition. We tried everything else first from massage to surgery. To tell us that the one medicine that gives us some relief is the cause of our chronic pain is ignorant and extends the harmful bias. Also if you take away the one medicine that provides at least some pain relief then patients can’t get moving well enough to access the other modalities and therapies. Perhaps in your case it was addiction and your pain was withdrawals but that isn’t true for everyone.
Mel Fitch • Nov 26, 2019 at 2:13 pm
Mitzie Nay…Im sorry about the loss of your son! I know what it feels like to lose a child. I also know how easy it is to say that opioids arent meant for long term use when you arent in a body with daily chronic pain. If u want to do a real study then I suggest you use a machine that simulates pain. Let’s see if you can function for a month while having other treatments fail to help your pain, and then be given a pill that works. Find out what it’s really like to have chronic pain and then you can tell me that you have truly studied pain.
For 2 years I tried every modality to deal with chronic pain. I refused all pain meds. Finally one day I decided that I needed to take my life back and agreed to opioid pain management. It was the best decision I had made for my health in 2 yrs. Now I can go get groceries without anxiety of making it through the shopping trip. I can do things in my home without having to constantly lay down. I can sleep through the night. I can shower when I want. I can even go have a pleasant dinner with family or friends without the gnawing feeling of pain constantly there.
To those listening, please DONT CRIMINALIZE chronic pain patients with diagnosed disorders, or injuries that have left them in pain. Allow our docs to manage our pain based on individual needs. There are some injuries and disorders that lead people to kill themselves because their pain wasn’t being managed due to this crack down on opioids. Even pets with pain are treated with more kindness and care than humans with pain.
I can say without doubt that if I dont have access to medication that treats pain, then I would prefer to die. Yes, there are things worse than death, and untreated chronic pain is one of them. There are about 40 million of us, and we have a right to medical means of treating our pain.
Carol Anne Benack • Nov 26, 2019 at 1:28 pm
As a 25 year survivor of CRPS, “The Suicide Disease,” among many other many painful conditions, I strongly urge Warren and the Dems to lay off the Rx Opioids. You are inadvertently murdering millions of law abiding Americans with your Fake Rx Opioid Hype ! I was on my meds being successfully treated for 18 years. Now, after a forced weaning, I wish for death to come quickly ! Congress and our Govt’ Agencies have sent our Doctors off running when they see a CPP coming . There used to be compassionate care in this country and now I feel like I live in Ethiopia !! stop with the lies we all know the Illicit dope is killing the addicts . stats are public , Drug wars have ben going on since Nixon Era. Remember Intractable Pain kills just like Cancer and hurts worse in many cases. Don’t believe me, do your own research ! Don’t Punish Pain
james cosgrove • Nov 26, 2019 at 12:53 pm
Politicians attack prescription drugs because that is the easy low-hanging fruit. So they (appear) to be doing something.
Everyone knows it is an illicit drug problem and fighting that is a much tougher problem that Politicians won’t look good in fighting.
So punish the chronic-pain sufferers, Yay! Politicians, good job. —Not
T • Nov 26, 2019 at 11:52 am
Mitzie Nay—seriously?
I’m sorry that your 19 year old died of an overdose, but how dare you lump all chronic pain patients (CPP) into the same boat!
You say that opioids are wrong for chronic pain. Really? Can I please see the long-term studies that support this theory? No. No, I can’t—because they don’t exist! Do tell, what magical alternative therapies would you suggest? Acupuncture? Massage? PT? Dry needling? What magical medication? Anti-depressants? Brain-cell-killing Neuro meds like Lyrica or Gabapentin? Muscle relaxers? How about supplements? Turmeric? Ginger? Black seed oil? Mg? Perhaps we should all take up yoga or tai chi? Maybe we should let our docs implant devices that won’t work, but also can’t be removed secondary to scar tissue? Maybe we all need a few more steroid injections? Oh wait! I’ve already done nearly everything on this list…and several other “therapies” that aren’t.
Nope. Instead, you want all of the CPP’s to just suck it up.
Taking the few MME’s that my physician prescribes allows me to cook, do laundry, pick up and hold my grand babies. Occasionally, I even have enough energy to remind my husband how much I love him. But you’re right. Anything could happen. I could lose my mind and decide to abuse my meds tomorrow. Never mind that I am required to sign a contract, make all appts, be drug tested, have pill counts, be scorned by pharmacists, etc., ad nauseum, for that privilege. Did I mention that I can’t afford insurance? So my doctor appts, testing, meds, procedures, et al, are all self-pay?
You’re right. Because YOUR son did something foolish with horrific results, every CPP should suffer MORE than they already do.
Mitzie Nay • Nov 26, 2019 at 10:16 am
For the most part, you’re spot on. However, opioids were never meant to treat chronic pain, ever. Opioids are meant for acute pain and end-of-life pain, that’s it. People with chronic pain need to find other, non-addictive ways to manage their pain. Often, patients using opioids for chronic pain have no idea that their “pain” comes from their dependence on the very drug they are taking to erase their pain…their pain comes when they don’t get their fix, but they think it’s their condition causing the pain, not the need for opioids. Yes, I’ve been studying this for over 4 years, ever since my 19-year-old son died from a heroin/meth overdose.
Bob Schubring • Nov 26, 2019 at 9:27 am
Methadone and Suboxone are inferior drugs for addiction treatment that cost a great deal of money to manufacture. Dr Forest Tennant recounts why he started treating California heroin addicts with Methadone in the 1970s: It wasn’t that Methadone was better for the addicts. It was that the toxicity of Methadone was higher, creating distinctive metabolites that would appear in a gas chromatography analysis of the urine. California needed to make sure that the addicts were not diverting the Methadone elsewhere, so proving that they actually took it, was the reason that the drug was selected.
Australia has had success at treating heroin addicts with cheap hydrocodone. It’s slow onset of effect lessens the euphoria that attracts addicts, but it stops withdrawal symptoms. The patient can be slowly titrated off the drug.
The US DEA and Suboxone lobbyists moved immediately to force hydrocodone onto Schedule II. A safer and less costly addiction treatment that competed with Suboxone was not in the Suboxone makers’ interests.
Intractable Pain • Nov 26, 2019 at 7:40 am
Are you kidding?!?! How about us people in pain? Where do we fit in?? As things are going now, we have been left out in the wind! With people like you and all the others calling anyone who takes meds “addicts”, you are hurting us pain patients. I am just flabbergasted by what’s happening…it’s almost 2020 and instead of managing our pain; we are being shut out!
I wish I could let you and everyone else share my body! See how long you last while the body progressively gets worse and not being able to do a damn thing! Not being able to combat the pain, not being able to find a Dr as they are all scared of treating someone in pain. Pretty soon you’ll be begging for it all to end.. almost like a nightmare. A nightmare that is my life.
Joel Robinson • Nov 26, 2019 at 7:14 am
Who ever wrote this is as clueless as every Democrat candidate, and needs to stay the heck out of medical journalism all together, because you clearly haven’t a clue, I wouldn’t be surprised if this is a paid hit piece paid for by PROP and the clown known as little Andy kolodny
Theresia Roberts • Nov 26, 2019 at 6:41 am
While I agree with you that attacking the supply before helping those in need is not the way to go, your plan of making supply available and then switching them to suboxone is way too simplistic. Addiction is very complex, way too complex to treat with only safe supply. People fall into addiction for a reason. Without extensive mental health therapy and treatment to determine the underlying issues there can be no successful treatment. Yes, lets treat them medically with appropriate doses while we are treating their emotional health as well. Then they can be VERY slowly tapered from the medication even without switching them to suboxone. Suboxone is no wonder drug. While it keeps the patient from experiencing withdrawal and stops the feelings of euphoria from use it is actually much harder to stop as the withdrawals are worse than from opioids. I do not support the use of suboxone for addiction as it simply delays withdrawls for as long as the patient is on it. I realize it is the “gold standard” for addiction treatment right now, but I do not agree with it’s use.
Kathy Pavelka • Nov 26, 2019 at 2:42 am
ONCE AGAIN THE ARTICLE ONLY TALKS ABOUT ADDICTION,WHAT ABOUT THE CHRONIC PAIN PATIENTS? WHERE DO YOU THINK 100 MILLION WITH CHRONIC PAIN HAVE GONE?WELL A LOT OF THEM HAVE COMMITTED SUICIDE AND MANY ARE STUCK IN BED,THEY HAVE LOST THEIR JOBS AND HOMES. AND WHY? WE HAVE KNOWN FOR YEARS IT’S FENTANYL/HEROIN KILLING PEOPLE SO WHY IS THE GOVERNMENT TORTURING INNOCENT PEOPLE,THAT HAVE BEEN SEVERELY INJURED IN ACCIDENTS AND SUFFER FROM PAINFUL MEDICAL CONDITIONS. ARE LIFE WAS HARD ENOUGH BEFORE BUT NOW IT’S BECOME UNBEARABLE. ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU’RE OWN GOVERNMENT WON’T HELP YOU. TOMORROW IT COULD BE YOU THAT’S DRIVING HOME FROM WORK AND BECAUSE SOMEONE IS ON THEIR PHONE NOT PAYING ATTENTION YOU’RE HIT AND YOU’RE LIFE WILL NEVER BE THE SAME. YOU’RE PAIN WILL NEVER STOP. IT’S TIME TO GIVE SUFFERING PEOPLE BACK THEIR MEDICINE. WHAT’S WRONG WITH PEOPLE HOW MANY MORE VETERANS HAVE TO SIT ON THEIR MEDICAL RECORDS AND PUT A BULLET IN THEIR HEAD. THEY HAVE BEEN CRYING OUT IN PAIN.WHY IS NOBODY LISTENING?