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Speaker 1: Welcome to tonight's classic episode fellow conspiracy realist, the Sackler Family.

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Speaker 2: They did it? Wait wait, the Usher.

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Speaker 3: Family exactly shout out to follow the House of Usher.

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Speaker 3: I think, honestly, of all of the opioid epidemic kind

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Speaker 3: of dramatizations, it gets it the best.

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Speaker 4: You watched it, finally, Matt, I've watching it. I think

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Speaker 4: it's it kicks ass.

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Speaker 2: It's so good.

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Speaker 4: But obviously a really serious topic.

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Speaker 3: We know that some of the pieces have fallen in

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Speaker 3: the game of chess, that is the US government's prosecution

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Speaker 3: of the Sackler family. Of course, the top, top, top

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Speaker 3: members of that family have largely gone, you know, with

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Speaker 3: its laps on wrists, and that's just unfortunately how these

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Speaker 3: kinds of things go.

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Speaker 2: But is it just them that's right now?

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Speaker 3: Of course, Yeah, there's a lot of nuance to this

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Speaker 3: conversation and a lot of players and moving pieces in

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Speaker 3: what actually created the opioid epidemic? Was it manufactured?

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Speaker 2: You know?

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Speaker 4: Was it a conspiracy from the highest levels?

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Speaker 1: And now in twenty twenty three, we can once again

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Speaker 1: look back at this and remember the old adage, if

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Speaker 1: the punishment for a crime is a fine, then the

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Speaker 1: ultimate crime is just being poor. From UFOs to psychic

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Speaker 1: powers and government conspiracies, history is riddled with unexplained events.

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Speaker 1: You can turn back now or learn the stuff they

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Speaker 1: don't want you to know.

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Speaker 2: Welcome back to the show. My name is Max, my.

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Speaker 4: Name is Noel.

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Speaker 1: They call me Ben. We are joined with our super

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Speaker 1: producer Paul Deckett. Most importantly, you are here. You are you,

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Speaker 1: and that makes this stuff they don't want you to know.

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Speaker 1: Today's episode deals with some issues that people may find

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Speaker 1: personally very disturbing. But we are here to shed a

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Speaker 1: little bit of daylight into a murky world and a

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Speaker 1: catastrophic occurrence that the US and other countries are experiencing

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Speaker 1: as we record the episode today, the subjects conspiracy Realist

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Speaker 1: is drugs, drug use, drug abuse, manufacturing and manufacturing. Oh

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Speaker 1: that's the most important part. Yes, whether we are talking

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Speaker 1: legal drugs, illegal, recreational, or purely medicinal, it's no secret.

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Speaker 1: There's a huge business, a multi billion dollar business. And

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Speaker 1: each day across this planet of ours, millions of people

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Speaker 1: depend on some form of drug to either what prolonged

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Speaker 1: their lives, to combat an ongoing incurable disease or condition,

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Speaker 1: or to escape their problems, whatever those may be. In

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Speaker 1: many cases, consumption of recreational drugs leads to injury or death.

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Speaker 1: And depending on where you're from, this is a question

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Speaker 1: for everyone. You may have grown up in a school

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Speaker 1: system with an anti drug program. I think we the

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Speaker 1: three of us, mentioned it before on the show Dare

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Speaker 1: Here in the United States.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, they ought to call it scare because

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Speaker 4: I have this really distinct memory of being in elementary

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Speaker 4: school and somebody giving this speech about when they were

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Speaker 4: addicted to crack cocaine and talking about like, and I

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Speaker 4: looked in the mirror one day and what I saw

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Speaker 4: was a skeleton looking back at me. And in my

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Speaker 4: third grade mind or whatever grade mind, I thought he

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Speaker 4: meant really like he saw a spooky skeleton looking back

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Speaker 4: at him in the mirror, and I was like, drugs

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Speaker 4: are terrifying.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, the old drug abuse resistance education program it was.

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Speaker 2: It was rampant in my school. Dare to say No.

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Speaker 1: Yes, Dare to keep a kid off drugs, Dare to

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Speaker 1: give a kid some hope. These are lyrics from the

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Speaker 1: song They Make You See.

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Speaker 4: Now it's just been relegated to a trendy hipster thrift

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Speaker 4: store shirt. Yeah, you get your hands on one of those,

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Speaker 4: you're living large.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, I think it's it's great to have them.

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Speaker 1: I still have some of my old Dear shirts, and.

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Speaker 2: I would say I, I I'm not against this idea

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Speaker 2: of having drug abuse resistant programs within schools. But there's

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Speaker 2: there's more to that story, but we can get into

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Speaker 2: that later.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm not against it either in theory. It's I'm

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Speaker 1: torn because I think in many cases some of those

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Speaker 1: programs encouraged kids to experiment with drugs.

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Speaker 4: Well, they did it throughout my education high school, high

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Speaker 4: school too, And I remember in high school somebody came

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Speaker 4: in with this like suitcase with replicas of all the drugs,

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Speaker 4: and I was like, I want to try that. I

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Speaker 4: want to try that. I want to try not really,

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Speaker 4: but it's it just it has this like candy vibe

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Speaker 4: to it, where everything looks like a fun little thing

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Speaker 4: you want to check out.

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Speaker 1: It's a little weird, and their success remains a matter

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Speaker 1: of debate today. These sorts of programs. You know, how

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Speaker 1: many of those how many of those kids in high

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Speaker 1: schoo would Okay, The joke at a school I attended

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Speaker 1: briefly was that you could tell all the kids who

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Speaker 1: won the essay awards for Dare because they were the

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Speaker 1: biggest potheads by senior year. Wow, every single one. And

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Speaker 1: maybe that's just that school, right. But today we're talking

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Speaker 1: about a certain type of drug, one that you may

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Speaker 1: have seen in that suitcase that Noel had just mentioned

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Speaker 1: when you were a child, One that previously launched numerous wars,

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Speaker 1: one that has shaped a lot of human civilization and

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Speaker 1: experienced the sinister renaissance in the modern age. Today we're

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Speaker 1: talking about opium, specifically the opioid crisis. So here are

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Speaker 1: the facts. First, what is opium? What is opium? What

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Speaker 1: is an opioid? How they how do they measure up?

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Speaker 2: Right? Opium is this old substance that's been around for forever.

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Speaker 2: It's a bitter, brownish, addictive narcotic drug. It consists of

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Speaker 2: the dried latex that surrounds immature seed capsules in this

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Speaker 2: this happy little flower plant called an opium poppy.

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Speaker 4: It's interesting to me because a lot of marijuana legalization advocates.

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Speaker 4: One of their arguments is, well, it grows from the ground,

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Speaker 4: so it's got to be okay. Well, you know, so

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Speaker 4: do poppies, and so do the coca plants, so kind

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Speaker 4: of it kind of kills that argument dead.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good point. And also, of course hashtag

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Speaker 1: not all poppies. The plant is that there's a specific

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Speaker 1: type of poppy, the opium poppy, that is used to

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Speaker 1: create this substance, and it.

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Speaker 2: Has been cultivated over millennia.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it dates way back and people loved it

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Speaker 1: when they first discovered it because it produces a lower

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Speaker 1: state of anxiety an increased sense of well being. You

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Speaker 1: get drowsy, you get a little apathetic, it's tough to concentrate,

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Speaker 1: and there are physical effects that you will hear people

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Speaker 1: relay as ways to encounter, ways to tell physically if

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Speaker 1: someone is under the influence of opium or an opioid.

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Speaker 1: Like a lat of law enforcement spends time teaching their

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Speaker 1: officials to diagnose on the fly, which is relatively unscientific.

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Speaker 4: I think it causes constriction of the pupils. For example,

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Speaker 4: they get very tiny.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and there's also a euphoria associated with it when

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Speaker 2: taken at certain levels with doses.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's why people chase the dragon, right, So they've

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Speaker 1: been chasing this dragon or people who use opium and

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Speaker 1: been chasing it for more than five thousand years. The

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Speaker 1: first references to growth and use date back to three thousand,

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Speaker 1: four hundred BCE, when Mesopotamians cultivated the opium poppy. Mesopotamia

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Speaker 1: is more or less where we would picture Southwest Asia today,

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Speaker 1: and Samerians referred to it as whole gill the way plant,

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Speaker 1: which makes sense.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: They passed it on to the Assyrians. The Assyrians passed

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Speaker 1: it on to the Egyptians. Greco Romans, of course, were

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Speaker 1: in the game. They also they saw it as a

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Speaker 1: both a painkiller and a something to do with bowels.

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Speaker 1: I can't remember if it was supposed to stop you

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Speaker 1: up or let you go.

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Speaker 4: I think it stops you up. I think that side

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Speaker 4: effect of opiate addiction is a chronic constipation.

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Speaker 1: So they understood its medicinal use in that regard.

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Speaker 4: But of course, would you want to do that if

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Speaker 4: you had like diarrhea, you had some kind of.

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Speaker 2: You die from diarrhea.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, But regardless though, the the primary appeal of this

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Speaker 1: substance had has always been the way it makes you feel, right,

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Speaker 1: uh pooper non poop aside, and the demand for this

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Speaker 1: increased internationally in early international trade opium play an increasingly

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Speaker 1: significant role. It it's easy to grow, so people in

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Speaker 1: the right climate would say, why do I have to

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Speaker 1: buy this stuff from this shady you know, the shady

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Speaker 1: Roman or the shady Assyrian or whatever, when I can

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Speaker 1: just take a poppy and then grow my own and

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Speaker 1: maybe you know, take care of my supply and then

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Speaker 1: sell it. So other countries began to grow this industry

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Speaker 1: and they expanded its availability. The old rule of supply

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Speaker 1: and demand still played a role here, so opium got

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Speaker 1: cheaper too as more countries were growing it.

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Speaker 2: And it quickly becomes a cash crop for a lot

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Speaker 2: of places.

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Speaker 4: Yes, as it remains so today, places that maybe lacked

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Speaker 4: other means of making money because of climate or location,

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Speaker 4: rocky terrain. I think that's part of what makes opium

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Speaker 4: so appealing to grow is because it's pretty adaptable or

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Speaker 4: it can grow and not the most ideal of situation circumstances.

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Speaker 1: And also it's easy to transport, you know, that's a

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Speaker 1: big thing. So people began cultivating it all along the

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Speaker 1: various trade routes through Eurasia which are collectively known today

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Speaker 1: as the Silk Road. So from the Mediterranean through Asia,

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Speaker 1: finally to China, opium was growing at this point. Let's

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Speaker 1: fast forward. That's a very high level look. There's some

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Speaker 1: excellent history podcast about this growth of opium in ancient

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Speaker 1: history right to us. If you want to hear them,

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Speaker 1: we'll send them along. I can safely say that these

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Speaker 1: are great because we didn't do them, so it's not

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Speaker 1: us bragging. They're objectively good. But one of the first

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Speaker 1: and most historically significant conflicts or catastrophes caused directly by opium,

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Speaker 1: it was a series of conflicts known as the Opium Wars.

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Speaker 1: The first one occurred in eighteen thirty nine through nineteen

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Speaker 1: forty two between China and Britain, and the second Opium

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Speaker 1: War occurred shortly after that in eighteen fifty six to

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Speaker 1: eighteen sixty. This was sometimes called the Arrow War, and

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Speaker 1: in that second one, Britain and France teamed up against China.

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Speaker 1: In each case the Western Powers were victorious, and in

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Speaker 1: each case the Western Powers were the bad guys.

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Speaker 2: Categorically, they're the ones that were They were pushing the

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Speaker 2: opium trade on back onto China because China was trying

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Speaker 2: to get away or stop the opium crisis that was

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Speaker 2: occurring within their country.

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Speaker 4: Now, is this one they would have had like these

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Speaker 4: opium dens or opium clubs or whatever, where people was

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Speaker 4: recreationally using it and it had become a problem socially

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Speaker 4: in the country.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. There, and in India adjacent to China. What essentially

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Speaker 1: happen was a trade imbalance. So there was a huge

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Speaker 1: demand for certain Chinese produced goods, silk, porcelain, stuff like that,

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Speaker 1: and the West wanted this stuff. It's consumers wanted it.

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Speaker 1: By consumers at this point for those kinds of goods

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Speaker 1: I generally mean the really wealthy people, the aristocrats and such.

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Speaker 1: But the problem was there was no reciprocity. China didn't

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Speaker 1: want anything that France and Britain were making.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but they did.

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Speaker 1: But Britain particularly did control these opium producing regions, and

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Speaker 1: they knew that they could engage a more successful trade

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Speaker 1: if they if they had something that the population of

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Speaker 1: China wanted, even more importantly, if they could create the

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Speaker 1: demand for something, if they could make people want it.

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Speaker 2: And can we just go back and just say they

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Speaker 2: were controlling those regions through colonial means, yes, through capturing

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Speaker 2: regions that were resource rich or in this case poppy rich.

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Speaker 1: Right, the East India Company and one of the most

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Speaker 1: one of the first globally successful corporations and definitely one

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Speaker 1: of the most brutal. So the addiction rate amongst the

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Speaker 1: Chinese population soared. They said, look, we're banning all opium,

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Speaker 1: don't bring it in. Britain started smuggling it through the

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Speaker 1: areas they controlled in India, and then they decided to

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Speaker 1: fight dirty. Ultimately, when they were victorious, what they got

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Speaker 1: were trade concessions and some subjugation, but they didn't They

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Speaker 1: did not succeed in colonizing China. It's too big and

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Speaker 1: not as not as vulnerable in a lot of ways

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Speaker 1: the other nations were. They also had no interest in

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Speaker 1: the spread of Western religion.

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Speaker 2: There you go, and I mean that's a huge deal.

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Speaker 2: You got indoctrinate as you move forward and colonize. And

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Speaker 2: we have made two videos on this subject. They're available

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Speaker 2: on YouTube and our website. One of them is called

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Speaker 2: have Countries really fought Wars over Opium? And the second

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Speaker 2: one is do the Opium Wars continue today? And they're

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Speaker 2: highly informative videos and they pull on a lot of

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Speaker 2: stuff that other our colleagues have done on the opium

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Speaker 2: wards in the past.

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Speaker 1: Right, like stuff you missed in history class. Stuff you

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Speaker 1: should know all hits, all classics. Hey, Matt, do those questions?

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Speaker 1: Do those videos still hold up? Would you say they're

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Speaker 1: still relevant in twenty eighteen?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. Well, and these are historical accounts of the

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Speaker 2: opium wars, so the first one is at least and

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Speaker 2: the second one really has to do with kind of

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Speaker 2: what we're talking about today.

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Speaker 1: Ah, I see, yeah, And speaking of today, what is

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Speaker 1: the legal status of opium? Right? This thing that launched

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Speaker 1: so many wars like an evil hellen of Troy. Today,

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Speaker 1: opium is considered illegal in most countries, including, oddly enough,

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Speaker 1: the countries where tons and tons literal tons of it

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Speaker 1: are produced each year, such as Afghanistan. It's still illegal there.

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Speaker 2: And again you're talking about substance that can fund anything

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Speaker 2: else in the country because there is so much money

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Speaker 2: to be made and not a lot of other resources

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Speaker 2: to be produced.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's I mean, that is a crucial point here,

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Speaker 1: I think.

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Speaker 2: So.

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Speaker 1: In the US, most opiates and synthetic opioids are considered

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Speaker 1: scheduled to narcotics by the DEEA Drug Enforcement Administration, and

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Speaker 1: because of this, they have to be prescribed by a physician.

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Speaker 1: They are highly regulated currently. Of all the opiates, opiate

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Speaker 1: or opioid being something derived from actual opium. Of all

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Speaker 1: of those things, heroin is the only one that is

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Speaker 1: Schedule one, which means the US government Uncle SAM considers

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Speaker 1: it that it has a high potential for abuse with little,

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Speaker 1: relatively little real medicinal value. Like to the US, this

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Speaker 1: is just a drug that does damage.

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Speaker 2: Just when it's heroin, and it's so fascinating, which is interesting.

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Speaker 2: Take half a step and then you've got all the

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Speaker 2: other drugs we're going to be talking about today.

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Speaker 1: And of the estimated global opium production, almost half of

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Speaker 1: it is legally produced for processing into these medicines that

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Speaker 1: you just mentioned, Matt. Any country can do this. Any

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Speaker 1: country in the world can apply to the UN. They've

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Speaker 1: got a thing called the Commission on Narcotic Drugs to cultivate, produce,

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Speaker 1: and trade opium legally because of this convention signed in

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixty one, the UN Single Convention on Narcotics Drugs,

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Speaker 1: and they'll have some supervision from another UN body. But

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Speaker 1: as of two thousand and one, there were eighteen countries

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Speaker 1: that do this legally, including countries you might expect like

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Speaker 1: Turkey or India who had historically produced opium. I'm not

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Speaker 1: doing a stereotype just based on historical But then other

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Speaker 1: countries like Australia and the United Kingdom also fall under this,

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Speaker 1: so they're also producing opium. I just want to be

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Speaker 1: clear about that. So that's opium. But we're going toward opioids.

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Speaker 1: What exactly is an opioid?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, opioids. It's kind of like this overarching umbrella term,

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Speaker 4: but it's used to describe substances that tick at least

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Speaker 4: three of the opium receptors in the brain that interact

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Speaker 4: with them. It's a class of drug that includes illegal,

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Speaker 4: the illegal narcotic heroin, but it also includes synthetic opioids

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Speaker 4: like fentanyl and other pain medications that can be obtained

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Speaker 4: legally with the prescription, like oxycodone. We've got some brand

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Speaker 4: names here, which is OxyContin, hydrocodone, or vicodin, codeine, morphine,

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Speaker 4: and tons of more. So, Okay, a little more on

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Speaker 4: the way the US and the DEA schedules drugs. There's

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Speaker 4: a system in place. Opioids vary from Schedule one. We

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Speaker 4: talked about earlier heroin being the only one that is

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Speaker 4: considered that meaning it has no medicinal use whatsoever and

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Speaker 4: high potential for abuse, and it goes to Schedule five

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Speaker 4: and depending on it, it's all depending on this perceived

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Speaker 4: medical usefulness, abuse potential, safety, drug dependence profile, which sounds

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Speaker 4: like a very high level way of saying.

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Speaker 1: Addictability, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, which is different from abuse potential.

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Speaker 1: Abuse potential is how likely would someone go overboard to

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Speaker 1: chase a particular effect to the fuzzies, And dependency is

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Speaker 1: how likely would somebody have to be normal with it?

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Speaker 4: And dependency and the argument or discussion surrounding that is

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Speaker 4: a huge part of today's story, which we'll get more

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Speaker 4: into in a bit. And heroin remains completely illegal to distribute, purchase,

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Speaker 4: or use outside of any kind of medical research, where

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Speaker 4: I don't know what that would look like.

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Speaker 1: Medical research in this sense would mean that a board

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Speaker 1: like clinical researchers or groups of doctors, often through a

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Speaker 1: university or government sponsored treatment center, will be able to

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Speaker 1: access opium or create heroin from it for the purpose

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Speaker 1: of creating maybe a new opioid, for the purpose of

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Speaker 1: learning more about how heroin itself affects users and it's.

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Speaker 2: Kind of similar to the like testing some of the

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Speaker 2: hallucinogen's right now, sure, see how they affect people with

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Speaker 2: either post traumatic stress disorder or something.

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Speaker 1: That's like MDMA R.

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Speaker 4: Yes.

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Speaker 1: Yes, And speaking of users, we would say one of

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Speaker 1: the most important parts of this story, let's learn a

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Speaker 1: little bit more about usage statistics for opium and opioids.

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Speaker 1: After a word from our sponsors, Okay, everyone, this is

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Speaker 1: the point where we dive into some numbers which are

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Speaker 1: fascinating and damning.

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Speaker 2: I would say, yeah, and important, and please try do

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Speaker 2: your best not to gloss over and soak these in.

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Speaker 2: There are a lot of numbers in this section we're

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Speaker 2: coming on too, but they are highly important.

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Speaker 1: So we dug up some relatively recent numbers. Just going

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Speaker 1: back a few years, the International Narcotics Control Board reported

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Speaker 1: that in twenty fifteen, ninety nine point seven percent of

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Speaker 1: the world's hydrocodone, known by its brand name vicodin, was

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Speaker 1: consumed in the US alone. Zero point three percent of

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Speaker 1: the world's vicodin is consumed outside of the US.

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Speaker 4: It's insane.

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Speaker 2: Do you think that has anything to do with our

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Speaker 2: ability within this country to promote drugs through advertising?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true. Yeah, we've mentioned it before, we should

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Speaker 1: mention it again. Will you break that down for anyone

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Speaker 1: who didn't hear this in earlier episodes? And is it

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Speaker 1: from the States.

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Speaker 2: In a lot of places outside of our grand little

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Speaker 2: experiment here you are, you're not allowed. It is illegal

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Speaker 2: to market prescription drugs to people, to try and sell

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Speaker 2: it as a product to purchase or to use.

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Speaker 4: Wait, so you're not allowed to have a happy housewife

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Speaker 4: dancing blissfully across the playground to her child waiting on

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Speaker 4: the swing sets.

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Speaker 2: Yes, no matter how many precautions you put at the

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Speaker 2: end of your ad, you cannot show it in many places.

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Speaker 4: With neon green grass and perfectly as your blue skies.

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Speaker 1: And very very vague. It's only allowed in New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: In the US, bonkers.

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Speaker 4: And I was even gonna bring up, like, what's that conversation,

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Speaker 4: like where you decide we're gonna call it vicadin? Is

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Speaker 4: there any etymology in the names of these drugs ever

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Speaker 4: at all? I've always wondered the case by case.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's similar to so, because this is private industry,

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Speaker 1: there's the marketing decision really comes down to conversation between

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Speaker 1: the CEOs the pr firms and maybe the people who

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Speaker 1: actually made the drug.

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Speaker 4: But I don't think the FDA would have any any

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Speaker 4: way in potential.

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Speaker 2: Because there because these groups present it to the FDA.

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Speaker 1: Right, yeah, and the FDA often is a series. They

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Speaker 1: will have some guidelines about this. But the FDA in

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Speaker 1: theory on paper and the FDA in practice are two

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Speaker 1: very very different organizations, unfortunately for most residents of this country.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, it's it's true. It's a case by case thing,

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Speaker 1: so they'll have there will be some policy conventions. There's

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Speaker 1: not a law, but there will be policy conventions such

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Speaker 1: as you can't name this.

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Speaker 4: Cansecure havy fun fund pills.

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Speaker 1: Right right, right, But I would argue that things like

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Speaker 1: Lyrica are pushing the line on that.

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Speaker 4: It sounds nice, yes right wow, just saying it out

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Speaker 4: loud makes me have a warm, fuzzy feeling.

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Speaker 1: Right, So it's it does go down to marketing. If

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Speaker 1: you are listening to this and you are you have

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Speaker 1: participated the naming of a drug, we would love to

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Speaker 1: hear your process.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, yeah, Tyland, all get at us right.

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Speaker 1: Exceedrin's a good one because he's had the root of

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Speaker 1: excel in there. That's an excellent. So throughout twenty sixteen,

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Speaker 1: regardless of what the names for these drugs were, there

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Speaker 1: were more than sixty three thousand, six hundred overdose deaths

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Speaker 1: in the US. Of those, sixty three thousand, six hundred

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Speaker 1: forty two, two hundred and forty nine involved an opioid,

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Speaker 1: that's sixty six percent. That's over sixty six percent, and

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Speaker 1: that if we want to math it out a little bit,

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Speaker 1: that equates to an average of one hundred and fifteen

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Speaker 1: overdose deaths just from opioids every single day in twenty sixteen.

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Speaker 4: Do we have a statistic as to whether there were

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Speaker 4: street opioids or prescription opioids, and I would love to

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Speaker 4: see a breakdown of that. Probably hard to.

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Speaker 1: Tell, well, yeah, because they gather that information, they assess

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Speaker 1: cause of death, and sometimes it might be difficult to

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Speaker 1: figure out how that got in their system. So I bet,

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Speaker 1: I bet you if we drill down enough we can

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Speaker 1: we can find something there, or we can find a

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Speaker 1: good guess. But that statistic is just some sort of opioid,

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Speaker 1: But still it's they're dead.

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Speaker 4: But given the prescription rate and the numbers, it sure

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Speaker 4: feels like a big chunk of those are probably legally

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Speaker 4: obtained and prescribed or sold by someone who legally obtained

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Speaker 4: and prescribed them to someone who maybe shouldn't have had.

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Speaker 1: Them from what they call pill mills pill mills.

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Speaker 4: Considering those numbers, we said at the top of the

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Speaker 4: show about how many people in this country rely on

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Speaker 4: prescription medication.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and we do have stats on the number of

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Speaker 1: opioid prescriptions in nineteen ninety two. This is troubling. It

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Speaker 1: goes to your question about how we can ascertain which

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Speaker 1: particular type of opioid people were trying, like street or prescription.

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Speaker 1: Nineteen ninety two, there were one hundred and twelve million

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Speaker 1: prescriptions written for some sort of opioid. By twenty twelve,

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Speaker 1: that had peaked to two hundred and eighty two million.

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry what, Yeah, per year, not per day. Well overdoubled. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: well overdoubled. The good news is it began to decline

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Speaker 1: after that by but not by that much. Two hundred

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Speaker 1: something million is the new normal. Now in twenty sixteen,

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Speaker 1: the number had fallen to two hundred and thirty six million,

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Speaker 1: so it's still more than doubled.

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Speaker 2: My gosh.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, and surely it's not a product of some kind

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Speaker 4: of massive population boom, right. You know, we definitely obviously

435
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Speaker 4: know that our population is growing, but certainly not by

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Speaker 4: that kind of number.

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Speaker 2: And all you're asking about a number that you could

438
00:25:46,080 --> 00:25:49,359
Speaker 2: point to to how many prescription deaths there have been.

439
00:25:49,640 --> 00:25:53,640
Speaker 2: So from nineteen ninety nine up until twenty fifteen, there

440
00:25:53,640 --> 00:25:57,520
Speaker 2: were roughly an estimated one hundred and eighty three thousand

441
00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:02,400
Speaker 2: deaths from prescription overdoses opiate overdose, which.

442
00:26:02,119 --> 00:26:07,639
Speaker 1: Means that's what the average of ninety one overdose.

443
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:09,400
Speaker 2: Deaths per day since ninety nine.

444
00:26:10,119 --> 00:26:14,520
Speaker 1: And as a result, to put this in perspective, this

445
00:26:14,600 --> 00:26:17,320
Speaker 1: means we have we have a lot of folks who

446
00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:20,800
Speaker 1: listen to this show while they're driving. Yeah, so this

447
00:26:20,880 --> 00:26:24,600
Speaker 1: might be good news for you. You are more likely

448
00:26:24,720 --> 00:26:29,280
Speaker 1: to die of an opioid overdose than a car crash. Yeah,

449
00:26:29,400 --> 00:26:31,560
Speaker 1: so you're safer in your car at least.

450
00:26:32,160 --> 00:26:35,639
Speaker 2: Man, you know, driving and work today. Four cars ahead

451
00:26:35,640 --> 00:26:37,840
Speaker 2: of me, some dude was trying to get off at

452
00:26:37,880 --> 00:26:40,600
Speaker 2: the fourteenth Street exit coming south on eighty five. This

453
00:26:40,640 --> 00:26:44,000
Speaker 2: is for all you Atlanta listeners. And as he's trying

454
00:26:44,000 --> 00:26:45,199
Speaker 2: to get over, he's trying to do it, you know,

455
00:26:45,280 --> 00:26:47,639
Speaker 2: right at the end, right before there's the guardrail and

456
00:26:47,720 --> 00:26:50,000
Speaker 2: every one of those and he couldn't make it. So

457
00:26:50,080 --> 00:26:52,840
Speaker 2: he like swung his car back to the left, made

458
00:26:52,880 --> 00:26:55,280
Speaker 2: another car get out of the way of him, and

459
00:26:55,359 --> 00:26:58,160
Speaker 2: ran into a truck just a couple of cars ahead

460
00:26:58,200 --> 00:26:58,359
Speaker 2: of me.

461
00:26:58,880 --> 00:27:01,560
Speaker 4: And so even a in Atlanta traffic, you're safer in

462
00:27:01,600 --> 00:27:04,680
Speaker 4: your car. You are taking prescription opius.

463
00:27:04,920 --> 00:27:07,160
Speaker 2: Yes, in a crazy place like this.

464
00:27:07,560 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 1: Statistically speaking at least, right, but yeah, that's that's a

465
00:27:12,119 --> 00:27:15,800
Speaker 1: sobering point. And as of twenty eighteen, more than two

466
00:27:16,000 --> 00:27:20,800
Speaker 1: million American residents have become either dependent on, or have

467
00:27:20,920 --> 00:27:25,439
Speaker 1: abused prescription pain pills and street drugs. So luckily at

468
00:27:25,520 --> 00:27:29,040
Speaker 1: least that's the total for the illegal trade as well

469
00:27:29,080 --> 00:27:32,399
Speaker 1: as the quote unquote legal one. And we have to

470
00:27:32,440 --> 00:27:36,480
Speaker 1: ask ourselves, at what point does this become an epidemic.

471
00:27:36,840 --> 00:27:39,919
Speaker 1: Most would argue that having this many people addicted to

472
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:43,760
Speaker 1: some derivative of opium or a similar narcotic means we're

473
00:27:43,800 --> 00:27:47,240
Speaker 1: already in a crisis. But if that doesn't tip the scale,

474
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:49,720
Speaker 1: if two million is not enough, then what does move

475
00:27:49,760 --> 00:27:52,800
Speaker 1: the needle? More deaths, a higher rate of addiction. Is

476
00:27:52,800 --> 00:27:55,479
Speaker 1: it a crisis when it's five million people? Is it

477
00:27:55,520 --> 00:27:57,439
Speaker 1: not a crisis until it's ten million.

478
00:27:58,080 --> 00:27:59,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, who decides that?

479
00:28:01,280 --> 00:28:06,399
Speaker 1: Well, I think recently the current president did declare that

480
00:28:06,440 --> 00:28:07,560
Speaker 1: there was a crisis.

481
00:28:07,680 --> 00:28:10,679
Speaker 2: Right Well, there have been cries to call it a

482
00:28:10,760 --> 00:28:14,600
Speaker 2: crisis for a long time, and the news, the media

483
00:28:14,640 --> 00:28:16,919
Speaker 2: has been calling it a crisis for years and years.

484
00:28:18,160 --> 00:28:20,800
Speaker 4: But didn't he stop just short of there being really

485
00:28:20,840 --> 00:28:24,480
Speaker 4: any real action behind it? Like I think declaring a

486
00:28:24,520 --> 00:28:27,480
Speaker 4: state of emergency or something allows some kind of federal

487
00:28:27,520 --> 00:28:30,480
Speaker 4: money to kick in to help mitigate a problem. And

488
00:28:30,520 --> 00:28:35,040
Speaker 4: I think his declaration stopped just short of anything real happening.

489
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:38,440
Speaker 4: It was more of a symbolic gesture than anything.

490
00:28:38,520 --> 00:28:40,240
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, it's a question of do we use tax

491
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:43,080
Speaker 2: money to actually combat it or do we say, yes,

492
00:28:43,120 --> 00:28:46,360
Speaker 2: it's a crisis and let's get more private institutions working

493
00:28:46,400 --> 00:28:46,720
Speaker 2: on it.

494
00:28:46,760 --> 00:28:49,840
Speaker 1: And right now that fight is going state by state,

495
00:28:50,320 --> 00:28:53,200
Speaker 1: and it leads us to another question, how did this

496
00:28:53,360 --> 00:28:56,640
Speaker 1: all happen? What caused this? It's sort of like that

497
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:01,280
Speaker 1: trope in film and televis where you get to a

498
00:29:01,320 --> 00:29:04,200
Speaker 1: freeze frame and someone you hear a voiceover say, you're

499
00:29:04,200 --> 00:29:07,360
Speaker 1: probably wondering how I got here? That's our question? What

500
00:29:07,600 --> 00:29:13,120
Speaker 1: brought us here? Here's where it gets crazy. According to

501
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:21,800
Speaker 1: numerous critics, policy researchers, government officials, medical experts, and more,

502
00:29:22,560 --> 00:29:26,440
Speaker 1: the cause of the current opioid epidemic isn't solely the

503
00:29:26,520 --> 00:29:32,040
Speaker 1: fault of say, like some illegal drug cartel over the

504
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:36,080
Speaker 1: border or in the Golden Triangle somewhere. It's not street

505
00:29:36,160 --> 00:29:39,760
Speaker 1: level dealers like Pooky in the wire. Instead, they argue

506
00:29:39,840 --> 00:29:42,920
Speaker 1: the blame for the present crisis falls squarely at the

507
00:29:42,960 --> 00:29:47,000
Speaker 1: feet of the pharmaceutical industry, the lobbyist it employees, and

508
00:29:47,040 --> 00:29:50,440
Speaker 1: the government officials with whom these lobbyists interact. I mean,

509
00:29:50,640 --> 00:29:54,000
Speaker 1: if we take a closer look, nearly seventy five percent

510
00:29:54,120 --> 00:29:58,000
Speaker 1: of people who are receiving treatment for heroin addiction didn't

511
00:29:58,040 --> 00:30:00,600
Speaker 1: just start doing heroin. They didn't wait up one day

512
00:30:00,640 --> 00:30:05,680
Speaker 1: and say, you know what, carpe dum. They began their

513
00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:10,680
Speaker 1: addiction by being prescribed opioid painkillers.

514
00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:12,400
Speaker 4: Yeah, typically for.

515
00:30:12,360 --> 00:30:15,560
Speaker 1: A painkilling thing, right. And these are often people who

516
00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:17,400
Speaker 1: don't have a history of drug abuse.

517
00:30:17,520 --> 00:30:19,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, And many times it has to do with being

518
00:30:19,840 --> 00:30:24,800
Speaker 2: prescribed a certain amount of opioid, so over a threshold

519
00:30:24,800 --> 00:30:28,680
Speaker 2: of days. I think the safe threshold is like seven

520
00:30:28,840 --> 00:30:31,680
Speaker 2: or something around that, and many of these begin when

521
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:35,640
Speaker 2: you get like two weeks three weeks worth of prescription painkillers.

522
00:30:36,040 --> 00:30:42,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the weird thing is that this statistic that

523
00:30:42,720 --> 00:30:44,720
Speaker 1: seventy five I think the number may have increased to

524
00:30:44,760 --> 00:30:48,920
Speaker 1: eighty percent now that the vast majority of people are

525
00:30:48,920 --> 00:30:53,880
Speaker 1: in treatment for heroin addiction in the US started heroin

526
00:30:54,080 --> 00:30:58,000
Speaker 1: after they could no longer get legal opioid prescriptions. This

527
00:30:58,640 --> 00:31:03,240
Speaker 1: is absolutolutely a well known fact, but it still has

528
00:31:03,360 --> 00:31:08,160
Speaker 1: yet to stop the rise in opioid prescriptions for pain relief.

529
00:31:08,480 --> 00:31:12,400
Speaker 1: That over the past ten years, the number of prescriptions

530
00:31:12,440 --> 00:31:14,880
Speaker 1: handed out has risen by three hundred percent.

531
00:31:15,240 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 4: Well, get this. There's an article from the Washington Post

532
00:31:17,960 --> 00:31:21,280
Speaker 4: from twenty fifteen, so not incredibly up to date, but

533
00:31:21,360 --> 00:31:24,760
Speaker 4: still The headline is why a bag of heroin costs

534
00:31:24,840 --> 00:31:27,320
Speaker 4: less than a pack of cigarettes, And it has a

535
00:31:27,360 --> 00:31:31,480
Speaker 4: map for the entire country showing about how much a

536
00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:33,880
Speaker 4: bag of heroin costs. And by bag, we're saying that's

537
00:31:33,960 --> 00:31:36,680
Speaker 4: that's about a dose. Maybe it's two doses, I'm not sure,

538
00:31:36,960 --> 00:31:43,000
Speaker 4: point being it's between seven and ten dollars for an

539
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:45,400
Speaker 4: amount of heroin that could potentially kill you. It would

540
00:31:45,400 --> 00:31:50,320
Speaker 4: be enough to completely put you put your button, the dirt,

541
00:31:50,360 --> 00:31:50,880
Speaker 4: you know what I mean.

542
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:54,760
Speaker 1: But how much does that how much does a heavy

543
00:31:54,800 --> 00:32:00,440
Speaker 1: heroin user use per day? Surely more than water two doses, absolutelysolutely.

544
00:32:00,600 --> 00:32:02,920
Speaker 4: And here's the thing too, I just looked up OxyContin

545
00:32:03,040 --> 00:32:06,720
Speaker 4: pill price and it says when legally sold, a ten

546
00:32:06,800 --> 00:32:09,920
Speaker 4: milligram tab of oxycotton is about a buck twenty five,

547
00:32:10,360 --> 00:32:13,960
Speaker 4: and an eighty milligram tablet will cost six dollars. When

548
00:32:14,040 --> 00:32:18,280
Speaker 4: illegally sold on the street, it can cost between ten

549
00:32:18,360 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 4: dollars and eighty dollars for one pill, depending on the dose,

550
00:32:22,880 --> 00:32:25,560
Speaker 4: So it's usually about a dollar a milligram, So an

551
00:32:25,600 --> 00:32:28,800
Speaker 4: eighty milligram oxy content is about eighty dollars.

552
00:32:29,240 --> 00:32:31,440
Speaker 1: And a tab is just a pill a pill, Okay.

553
00:32:32,280 --> 00:32:35,200
Speaker 4: So you can see maybe if you can't get it

554
00:32:35,280 --> 00:32:38,800
Speaker 4: legally prescribed and you're relying on those pill mills or

555
00:32:39,080 --> 00:32:41,320
Speaker 4: buying it illegally from someone who does have the prescription,

556
00:32:41,360 --> 00:32:42,800
Speaker 4: which is certainly how a lot of this stuff gets

557
00:32:42,800 --> 00:32:47,480
Speaker 4: into circulation, you could see the attraction of buying those

558
00:32:48,200 --> 00:32:51,600
Speaker 4: seven dollars bags of heroin if you're really addicted to

559
00:32:51,640 --> 00:32:55,280
Speaker 4: that particular you know, buzz yeah.

560
00:32:55,360 --> 00:32:58,040
Speaker 1: And then people would say, well, I'm not. I'm doing

561
00:32:58,080 --> 00:33:01,000
Speaker 1: this as a stopgap, right, and I'm not going to

562
00:33:01,040 --> 00:33:03,400
Speaker 1: shoot it up. I'm not going to take it intravenously.

563
00:33:03,400 --> 00:33:05,840
Speaker 1: I'm not going to insulfate or whatever. I'm just going

564
00:33:05,880 --> 00:33:09,400
Speaker 1: to maybe smoke it or snort it. Yeah yeah, right,

565
00:33:09,480 --> 00:33:12,400
Speaker 1: maybe get to snorting it, but never shooting it. So

566
00:33:12,480 --> 00:33:16,360
Speaker 1: one of the big There's some demographics that fall into

567
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:18,600
Speaker 1: this too that we would be remiss if we didn't mention.

568
00:33:18,680 --> 00:33:20,560
Speaker 1: We'll get to them by the end of the episode,

569
00:33:20,760 --> 00:33:27,600
Speaker 1: but for now we can say that opiate manufacturers know

570
00:33:27,840 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: how much money is at stake. They've spent more than

571
00:33:31,360 --> 00:33:34,560
Speaker 1: eight hundred and eighty million over the past ten years

572
00:33:35,600 --> 00:33:37,760
Speaker 1: just to not to make new drugs, but just to

573
00:33:37,840 --> 00:33:42,960
Speaker 1: keep control over the making and distribution of these substances.

574
00:33:44,120 --> 00:33:46,400
Speaker 2: Yeah, we almost said products, but it just makes you

575
00:33:46,440 --> 00:33:48,800
Speaker 2: want to bomb it a little bit, right, It's true.

576
00:33:49,200 --> 00:33:52,600
Speaker 1: And this money, where did this massive amount of cash

577
00:33:53,160 --> 00:33:55,000
Speaker 1: come from? Where do we get this number? It comes

578
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:59,480
Speaker 1: from their lobbying and campaign contributions. And this has been

579
00:33:59,560 --> 00:34:04,000
Speaker 1: used in large settlements with anyone looking to challenge what

580
00:34:06,600 --> 00:34:09,480
Speaker 1: is commonly called big pharma. I know, when you hear

581
00:34:09,520 --> 00:34:12,920
Speaker 1: that phrase makes it easy to dismiss this as some

582
00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:16,719
Speaker 1: looney tunes conspiracy theory. But there is a huge industry,

583
00:34:16,840 --> 00:34:19,400
Speaker 1: it's real. Call it big pharma and call it whatever

584
00:34:19,400 --> 00:34:20,960
Speaker 1: you want. It's not going to stop them.

585
00:34:21,080 --> 00:34:25,800
Speaker 2: Yeah. A small group of very profitable companies.

586
00:34:25,440 --> 00:34:29,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, very powerful, and they have, you know, a lot

587
00:34:29,000 --> 00:34:33,920
Speaker 4: of money for lobbyists to wield legislative influence and make

588
00:34:33,960 --> 00:34:36,880
Speaker 4: sure that that pill money keeps on a flowing.

589
00:34:37,400 --> 00:34:45,439
Speaker 1: Yeah. In the nineteen nineties, pharmaceutical companies reassured the medical community, doctors, researchers, hospitals,

590
00:34:45,560 --> 00:34:49,960
Speaker 1: medical institutions that patients would not become addicted to prescription

591
00:34:50,200 --> 00:34:56,560
Speaker 1: opioid pain relievers. This is different from heroin. This is

592
00:34:56,640 --> 00:35:01,359
Speaker 1: a morphine, right, or opium. This is FDA proved this.

593
00:35:01,640 --> 00:35:06,520
Speaker 1: We have specifically made this to mitigate or ameliorate some

594
00:35:06,680 --> 00:35:10,759
Speaker 1: of those concerns about the possibility of addiction. And then

595
00:35:10,840 --> 00:35:14,960
Speaker 1: healthcare providers began to prescribe them at these drugs rather

596
00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:17,640
Speaker 1: at greater rates. And when they say they persuaded them

597
00:35:17,680 --> 00:35:20,960
Speaker 1: and reassured them that that's where money comes into play.

598
00:35:21,040 --> 00:35:22,600
Speaker 1: It's a little bit of a euphemistic thing.

599
00:35:22,680 --> 00:35:27,080
Speaker 4: Well, you know our mousepads, right, Yeah.

600
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:28,359
Speaker 2: I think we just have to say right here at

601
00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:32,600
Speaker 2: the top that there are a lot of people everywhere

602
00:35:32,600 --> 00:35:36,440
Speaker 2: on this planet that are in constant pain that just

603
00:35:36,560 --> 00:35:40,000
Speaker 2: kind of live in some kind of pain. Yes, sure

604
00:35:40,040 --> 00:35:45,800
Speaker 2: that exists, and it subsists, and the invention of these

605
00:35:46,480 --> 00:35:51,560
Speaker 2: products what is and was kind of this amazing miracle

606
00:35:51,680 --> 00:35:53,880
Speaker 2: thing for people who are just constantly in pain. You mean,

607
00:35:53,880 --> 00:35:56,600
Speaker 2: I could take a pill and I don't hurt always.

608
00:35:57,080 --> 00:36:00,920
Speaker 1: Right, It's not a cure, but it's a it's not

609
00:36:01,200 --> 00:36:04,640
Speaker 1: it lessens the curse. Yeah, chronic and curable pain.

610
00:36:04,880 --> 00:36:08,279
Speaker 2: It almost the idea of it at least gives the

611
00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:10,840
Speaker 2: lives back to people who are taking it.

612
00:36:10,920 --> 00:36:12,000
Speaker 1: Right, That's powerful.

613
00:36:12,280 --> 00:36:14,520
Speaker 2: So you can see you can kind of see here

614
00:36:14,600 --> 00:36:20,960
Speaker 2: where a lot of it is mental from the manufacturers

615
00:36:21,000 --> 00:36:24,440
Speaker 2: to the end user of I'm doing something good or

616
00:36:24,480 --> 00:36:27,439
Speaker 2: this is helping me, this is giving me my life back. Yeah,

617
00:36:27,680 --> 00:36:28,640
Speaker 2: I just want to throw that.

618
00:36:28,600 --> 00:36:32,719
Speaker 1: In that that's a brilliant point. In the nineteen nineties,

619
00:36:32,920 --> 00:36:37,360
Speaker 1: everyone wanted to believe these statements, yes, by the pharmaceutical companies,

620
00:36:37,600 --> 00:36:40,760
Speaker 1: and perhaps you know what, you know what, man, perhaps

621
00:36:40,840 --> 00:36:43,759
Speaker 1: they believed it too. Yeah, let's just look, maybe they

622
00:36:43,800 --> 00:36:48,239
Speaker 1: did either way, whether they were purposely being deceptive or

623
00:36:48,320 --> 00:36:54,000
Speaker 1: whether they honestly just somehow didn't do even the most

624
00:36:54,040 --> 00:36:58,960
Speaker 1: cursory research on this stuff. Whatever happened, it led to

625
00:36:59,760 --> 00:37:03,600
Speaker 1: the misuse of these medications and eventually became clear that

626
00:37:03,680 --> 00:37:08,200
Speaker 1: they were highly addictive, and anyone who said otherwise was

627
00:37:08,239 --> 00:37:14,240
Speaker 1: either lying or cartoonishly wrong. And first, it is valid

628
00:37:14,320 --> 00:37:17,720
Speaker 1: for defenders of these companies to say you cannot blame

629
00:37:17,840 --> 00:37:22,120
Speaker 1: drug companies for legally selling something the FDA approved, But

630
00:37:22,719 --> 00:37:26,280
Speaker 1: the problem with that is pharmaceutical companies didn't just sell

631
00:37:26,320 --> 00:37:31,279
Speaker 1: these opioids. They also brutally suppressed legislation that would have

632
00:37:31,680 --> 00:37:36,640
Speaker 1: limited addiction among patients, including, for instance, a bill in

633
00:37:36,760 --> 00:37:40,080
Speaker 1: Tennessee that was designed to reduce the number of newborns

634
00:37:40,200 --> 00:37:44,440
Speaker 1: who were born addicted to opiates. For some reason, the

635
00:37:44,560 --> 00:37:48,959
Speaker 1: drug companies heavily lobbied to kill that bill and successfully.

636
00:37:49,160 --> 00:37:52,040
Speaker 1: In New Mexico, there was another proposed bill that was

637
00:37:52,080 --> 00:37:55,800
Speaker 1: supposed to limit the initial prescription of opioids for acute

638
00:37:55,800 --> 00:37:58,799
Speaker 1: pain to your PA point MATT to seven days to

639
00:37:58,880 --> 00:38:02,520
Speaker 1: a week, and that make addiction less likely and produce

640
00:38:02,560 --> 00:38:03,920
Speaker 1: fewer leftover.

641
00:38:03,560 --> 00:38:05,759
Speaker 2: Pills, which is such a idea a.

642
00:38:05,680 --> 00:38:09,640
Speaker 1: Big problem, but that legislation got killed as well. And

643
00:38:10,160 --> 00:38:14,279
Speaker 1: let's be even more fair here, they didn't just kill

644
00:38:14,400 --> 00:38:16,920
Speaker 1: certain bills or proposals. You don't want to make it

645
00:38:16,960 --> 00:38:21,000
Speaker 1: sound like that they were instrumental. In fact, this might

646
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:24,839
Speaker 1: surprise some people in supporting several key pieces of legislation

647
00:38:25,200 --> 00:38:30,240
Speaker 1: related to opioids. They were huge fans of a bill

648
00:38:30,320 --> 00:38:35,200
Speaker 1: in Maine that required insurers to cover the company's abuse

649
00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:39,239
Speaker 1: deterrent painkillers. Do you like that phrase abuse deterrence?

650
00:38:39,920 --> 00:38:43,680
Speaker 2: Right? Wait, what are what are these abuse deterrent painkillers?

651
00:38:43,719 --> 00:38:44,920
Speaker 2: This is a special version.

652
00:38:45,160 --> 00:38:49,160
Speaker 1: Well, the idea is that they aren't there, you're less

653
00:38:49,239 --> 00:38:53,239
Speaker 1: likely to get addicted again. That's how they were sold.

654
00:38:53,080 --> 00:38:56,000
Speaker 4: Things like time release kind of like stuff like that,

655
00:38:56,080 --> 00:38:58,640
Speaker 4: because I know that like early on you would always

656
00:38:58,680 --> 00:39:02,440
Speaker 4: read that with oxy content, for example, you could crush

657
00:39:02,480 --> 00:39:04,799
Speaker 4: them up and snort them like we were talking about.

658
00:39:04,840 --> 00:39:07,600
Speaker 4: And we found out that the that the companies knew

659
00:39:07,640 --> 00:39:09,600
Speaker 4: that was being done, that there was that kind of abuse.

660
00:39:10,120 --> 00:39:13,239
Speaker 4: But then later there were versions of them that you

661
00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:15,680
Speaker 4: could not do that with. They had some special coding

662
00:39:16,000 --> 00:39:19,480
Speaker 4: that you could not break or it would fundamentally change

663
00:39:19,520 --> 00:39:22,600
Speaker 4: the nature of the drug, and it prevented you from

664
00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:23,959
Speaker 4: doing this is that the kind of stuff you're talking about.

665
00:39:24,120 --> 00:39:28,640
Speaker 1: Yeah, those would be a couple of examples. And I

666
00:39:28,719 --> 00:39:31,960
Speaker 1: don't know if there's anything that's industry wide with that,

667
00:39:32,120 --> 00:39:34,399
Speaker 1: because again, these are all private companies, but it would

668
00:39:34,440 --> 00:39:38,719
Speaker 1: be stuff like time release, for instance, or something that

669
00:39:38,760 --> 00:39:41,759
Speaker 1: coding you mentioned is fascinating everyone to read more about that.

670
00:39:42,080 --> 00:39:45,919
Speaker 1: But I'm glad you're bringing up specific examples because we'll

671
00:39:45,960 --> 00:39:52,280
Speaker 1: get to some specific examples of instances wherein these pharmaceutical

672
00:39:52,280 --> 00:39:56,040
Speaker 1: companies became let's say, controversial. Sure, after a word from

673
00:39:56,080 --> 00:40:05,360
Speaker 1: our sponsors. All right, twenty seventeen.

674
00:40:06,080 --> 00:40:07,960
Speaker 2: Day, I am there. Let's see what's going on.

675
00:40:08,760 --> 00:40:10,440
Speaker 1: It's it's it's about a year ago.

676
00:40:10,600 --> 00:40:14,280
Speaker 4: Oh, oh, you're right, Okay, much much the same.

677
00:40:14,440 --> 00:40:15,200
Speaker 1: What's going on?

678
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:19,240
Speaker 4: First? We love? What what season of Game of Thrones

679
00:40:19,239 --> 00:40:20,040
Speaker 4: are we on at that point?

680
00:40:20,520 --> 00:40:20,719
Speaker 3: Right?

681
00:40:20,920 --> 00:40:21,839
Speaker 1: Right? Is it?

682
00:40:21,840 --> 00:40:23,160
Speaker 4: We're still wrapping up the last one?

683
00:40:23,239 --> 00:40:23,399
Speaker 2: Right?

684
00:40:23,480 --> 00:40:27,920
Speaker 1: I think so? Yeah? And you know, the four of

685
00:40:28,000 --> 00:40:33,239
Speaker 1: us are all still devastatingly handsome, h reasonably witty.

686
00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:36,000
Speaker 4: Man, you devil, I'm a sly one.

687
00:40:36,080 --> 00:40:36,279
Speaker 2: Right.

688
00:40:37,480 --> 00:40:42,480
Speaker 1: And there's also a senator named Claire mccaskell, Democrat out

689
00:40:42,520 --> 00:40:46,880
Speaker 1: of Missouri, who releases a report about an Arizona based

690
00:40:47,000 --> 00:40:51,759
Speaker 1: drug maker named in ciss I n s y S. Yes,

691
00:40:52,560 --> 00:40:58,280
Speaker 1: they make an opioid called Subsis s U b s ys.

692
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:04,480
Speaker 1: It contains and in this senator's support again this twenty seventeen,

693
00:41:05,480 --> 00:41:09,280
Speaker 1: there are a ton of internal documents from the company,

694
00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:13,839
Speaker 1: from Insists itself describing how it works to get over

695
00:41:13,920 --> 00:41:19,399
Speaker 1: these barriers called prior authorizations. Subsists the drug is meant

696
00:41:19,400 --> 00:41:24,160
Speaker 1: for one thing, and one thing alone, for cancer related pain.

697
00:41:24,719 --> 00:41:28,040
Speaker 1: If you want to get it for anything else, you

698
00:41:28,200 --> 00:41:33,279
Speaker 1: have to get prior authorization from your doctor. So it

699
00:41:33,320 --> 00:41:38,160
Speaker 1: turns out internally Insists had a whole department within the

700
00:41:38,200 --> 00:41:43,520
Speaker 1: company just for doing this, just forgetting these prior authorizations.

701
00:41:42,840 --> 00:41:44,440
Speaker 2: And it was not above board.

702
00:41:44,719 --> 00:41:48,080
Speaker 1: No, no, no. The employees in this department would call

703
00:41:48,920 --> 00:41:53,320
Speaker 1: pharmacy benefit managers, who are in charge of these prior authorizations.

704
00:41:53,480 --> 00:41:54,640
Speaker 2: You've got to love the terms.

705
00:41:54,880 --> 00:41:59,200
Speaker 1: Yeah, and they would pretend they were with a doctor's

706
00:41:59,320 --> 00:42:04,080
Speaker 1: office to get the sign off for Subsists to be

707
00:42:04,200 --> 00:42:07,960
Speaker 1: prescribed to a patient who did not have cancer.

708
00:42:08,840 --> 00:42:09,280
Speaker 2: Wow.

709
00:42:09,480 --> 00:42:12,440
Speaker 1: So my question is is that not fraud?

710
00:42:13,440 --> 00:42:15,799
Speaker 2: I think it is. I would argue that it was

711
00:42:16,040 --> 00:42:16,840
Speaker 2: like it like.

712
00:42:16,840 --> 00:42:19,759
Speaker 1: The definition of fraud it's illegal for us to call

713
00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:22,280
Speaker 1: a pharmacy and pretend to be a doctor's office.

714
00:42:22,480 --> 00:42:28,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, m all right, is it all right? We see

715
00:42:28,160 --> 00:42:29,080
Speaker 2: you in sis.

716
00:42:29,400 --> 00:42:32,080
Speaker 1: And then there's there's another example, which is one that

717
00:42:32,160 --> 00:42:35,399
Speaker 1: I think really stood out to all of us. This

718
00:42:35,440 --> 00:42:37,719
Speaker 1: company is one of the most well known cases of

719
00:42:38,320 --> 00:42:41,160
Speaker 1: we're going to be alliterative pharmaceutical perfidy.

720
00:42:41,560 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 2: Oh wait, word of the day, perfety. What does it mean?

721
00:42:46,719 --> 00:42:51,040
Speaker 1: It's deceitful, untrustworthy, treacherous, duplicitous, perfidy.

722
00:42:51,120 --> 00:42:51,919
Speaker 2: You're word of the day.

723
00:42:52,640 --> 00:43:00,480
Speaker 1: Okay, thank you, Matt So. Purdue Pharma is a company

724
00:43:00,520 --> 00:43:05,319
Speaker 1: that aggressively marketed oxy cotton and they made it. They

725
00:43:05,360 --> 00:43:08,360
Speaker 1: made it, and that's the brand name for Is it

726
00:43:08,440 --> 00:43:10,280
Speaker 1: hydrocodone or is that vicotin?

727
00:43:10,800 --> 00:43:12,400
Speaker 4: I think it's oxy codone.

728
00:43:12,440 --> 00:43:15,200
Speaker 1: Isn't it oxy codone? I think yes, you were correct.

729
00:43:15,239 --> 00:43:22,960
Speaker 1: Thank you. Oxy Conton, marketed by Purdue, was claimed to

730
00:43:22,960 --> 00:43:24,279
Speaker 1: be one of those things that was going to be

731
00:43:24,360 --> 00:43:28,399
Speaker 1: less addictive, right than a heroin and have all same

732
00:43:28,440 --> 00:43:32,880
Speaker 1: great benefits, same great taste, far fewer calories, very American

733
00:43:32,920 --> 00:43:38,040
Speaker 1: in the marketing, right, but they also claimed The company

734
00:43:38,080 --> 00:43:42,880
Speaker 1: claimed that they were unaware of the growing abuse of

735
00:43:42,960 --> 00:43:46,880
Speaker 1: oxy contin, which I think is also called in some

736
00:43:46,880 --> 00:43:50,280
Speaker 1: some parts of Appalachia at least is called hillbilly heroin.

737
00:43:50,400 --> 00:43:52,880
Speaker 4: It is right, and I spoiled a little bit of

738
00:43:52,920 --> 00:43:55,120
Speaker 4: this earlier, but let's get into some details here.

739
00:43:55,680 --> 00:43:59,279
Speaker 1: So it turns out that a copy of a confidential

740
00:43:59,480 --> 00:44:03,760
Speaker 1: Justice Toon Apartment report surfaced, and it shows that federal

741
00:44:03,840 --> 00:44:09,600
Speaker 1: prosecutors investigating Purdue found that Purdue knew about quote significant

742
00:44:09,680 --> 00:44:13,400
Speaker 1: abuse of this drug, in particular in the first few

743
00:44:13,480 --> 00:44:16,759
Speaker 1: years after they introduced it in nineteen ninety six, and

744
00:44:16,800 --> 00:44:19,560
Speaker 1: then they covered it up. They were aware that people

745
00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:24,600
Speaker 1: would do insane things to satisfy oxy cotton. They saw

746
00:44:24,680 --> 00:44:28,560
Speaker 1: that pills were being sold illegally and then crushed and

747
00:44:28,640 --> 00:44:31,400
Speaker 1: snorted or cut with other stuff, you know, and that

748
00:44:31,440 --> 00:44:34,920
Speaker 1: they would be stolen from pharmacies, sometimes in violent robberies.

749
00:44:35,080 --> 00:44:37,319
Speaker 4: Yeah, like drugstore cowboy style if you've ever seen that

750
00:44:37,520 --> 00:44:38,520
Speaker 4: Gus van Zam movie.

751
00:44:39,280 --> 00:44:42,319
Speaker 1: And then they would some doctors were being charged with

752
00:44:42,680 --> 00:44:46,200
Speaker 1: just selling prescriptions. Just come into my pill mill where

753
00:44:46,200 --> 00:44:50,040
Speaker 1: the address changes every few years, give me fifty bucks,

754
00:44:50,080 --> 00:44:50,719
Speaker 1: tell me what you want.

755
00:44:50,760 --> 00:44:54,719
Speaker 2: It's despicable, and guess what they did. They went on

756
00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:57,040
Speaker 2: ahead they pushed forward and they said, no, no, no

757
00:44:57,120 --> 00:45:01,279
Speaker 2: oxy cotton. Guys, this is less own to addiction then

758
00:45:01,360 --> 00:45:04,480
Speaker 2: other prescription opioids. It's the better choice for you and

759
00:45:04,520 --> 00:45:07,080
Speaker 2: your family and then family.

760
00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:13,839
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. And today Purdue maintains that it had absolutely

761
00:45:14,000 --> 00:45:17,840
Speaker 1: no knowledge of the abuse potential until two thousand, again

762
00:45:17,920 --> 00:45:22,520
Speaker 1: despite internal memos from the higher ups, multiple memos and

763
00:45:22,680 --> 00:45:25,319
Speaker 1: conversations that clearly contradict this.

764
00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:30,120
Speaker 2: Can we go ahead and just talk about the Sackler family, Yeah.

765
00:45:30,040 --> 00:45:30,600
Speaker 1: Lay it on the meat.

766
00:45:30,800 --> 00:45:31,680
Speaker 2: This is just really fast.

767
00:45:31,760 --> 00:45:34,760
Speaker 1: So the Sackler family, ultimately they're the owners of Purdue.

768
00:45:35,120 --> 00:45:39,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's there are about twenty individuals that share the

769
00:45:39,120 --> 00:45:44,080
Speaker 2: wealth of this one family that owns Purdue, and it's

770
00:45:44,360 --> 00:45:47,000
Speaker 2: it's fascinating. I think they have a net income or

771
00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:50,439
Speaker 2: a net family worth of around thirteen billion dollars right now,

772
00:45:51,960 --> 00:45:53,680
Speaker 2: at least that's according to Forbes.

773
00:45:54,200 --> 00:45:56,239
Speaker 1: They're eating pillion dollars.

774
00:45:56,680 --> 00:46:00,000
Speaker 4: The you would say that, I love that. Yeah.

775
00:46:00,040 --> 00:46:04,399
Speaker 2: Yes, they bought this this drug manufacturer a long time

776
00:46:04,440 --> 00:46:06,680
Speaker 2: ago in nineteen fifty two, the one that was just

777
00:46:06,760 --> 00:46:07,680
Speaker 2: kind of around.

778
00:46:07,400 --> 00:46:15,800
Speaker 4: It's fledgling, young upstock drug manufacturyarium.

779
00:46:14,080 --> 00:46:17,560
Speaker 2: And they were making things again. According to Forbes like

780
00:46:18,400 --> 00:46:21,240
Speaker 2: uh ear wax remover and laxative.

781
00:46:20,880 --> 00:46:21,800
Speaker 4: Tonics, no doubt.

782
00:46:21,960 --> 00:46:24,040
Speaker 2: Yes, you know. Thing well, I mean it's nineteen fifty two.

783
00:46:24,080 --> 00:46:26,600
Speaker 2: They're making they're making prescription drugs and stuff like that

784
00:46:26,600 --> 00:46:28,360
Speaker 2: to cocaine and.

785
00:46:28,280 --> 00:46:32,160
Speaker 1: I'm sure mother's little helper, right but.

786
00:46:32,320 --> 00:46:35,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, But apparently they didn't have really much going on,

787
00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 2: as you know, a way of bringing money into the

788
00:46:38,520 --> 00:46:43,360
Speaker 2: company until they made this drug oxycont and in nineteen

789
00:46:43,400 --> 00:46:45,880
Speaker 2: ninety five that's when they officially were making it or

790
00:46:45,880 --> 00:46:49,040
Speaker 2: like made it, and from that point on that was

791
00:46:49,120 --> 00:46:51,920
Speaker 2: the thing. I mean, it's literally the cash cow or

792
00:46:51,920 --> 00:46:53,880
Speaker 2: the heroin that they came upon.

793
00:46:53,840 --> 00:46:55,360
Speaker 4: More like oxy Koching.

794
00:46:55,960 --> 00:46:58,759
Speaker 1: I mean, there we go, yes, yes, worth it.

795
00:46:59,520 --> 00:47:03,400
Speaker 2: Yeah, but they're the number nineteen most wealthy family in

796
00:47:03,440 --> 00:47:04,520
Speaker 2: the world right now.

797
00:47:04,400 --> 00:47:06,799
Speaker 1: Insane and they made that money. They made the bulk

798
00:47:06,840 --> 00:47:10,200
Speaker 1: of it off of this particular.

799
00:47:11,480 --> 00:47:11,960
Speaker 4: Product.

800
00:47:12,560 --> 00:47:15,360
Speaker 2: Yeah. Oh I'm sorry, number nineteen in America.

801
00:47:15,480 --> 00:47:18,320
Speaker 1: Oh okay, world, there we go. You know, it's still

802
00:47:19,360 --> 00:47:21,799
Speaker 1: kudos to you Sacklers.

803
00:47:22,080 --> 00:47:23,839
Speaker 4: If you want to dig a little deeper into that,

804
00:47:23,880 --> 00:47:26,520
Speaker 4: there's an article in The New Yorker with a fabulous

805
00:47:26,520 --> 00:47:29,720
Speaker 4: headline it's the family that built an Empire of Pain.

806
00:47:30,160 --> 00:47:34,280
Speaker 4: The Sackler dynasty's ruthless marketing of painkillers has generated billions

807
00:47:34,320 --> 00:47:36,919
Speaker 4: of dollars and millions of addicts.

808
00:47:37,239 --> 00:47:40,279
Speaker 1: That's a great title and surprisingly accurate. Let's look at

809
00:47:40,320 --> 00:47:44,680
Speaker 1: those distribution statistics. Between twenty seven and twenty sixteen, the

810
00:47:44,719 --> 00:47:49,000
Speaker 1: most widely prescribed opioid was Actually it was an oxycodone,

811
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:52,640
Speaker 1: not this time. No, it's hydrocodon vicated, which you might

812
00:47:52,719 --> 00:47:56,400
Speaker 1: remember from some of EM and M's earlier lyrics.

813
00:47:56,640 --> 00:47:58,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, and you know movies from the eighties.

814
00:47:59,080 --> 00:48:03,279
Speaker 2: Yes, or you know, just any of your relatives or

815
00:48:03,320 --> 00:48:05,520
Speaker 2: friends who have been prescribed it. Yeah.

816
00:48:05,640 --> 00:48:09,680
Speaker 1: In twenty sixteen, six point two billion hydrocodone pills were

817
00:48:09,680 --> 00:48:14,799
Speaker 1: distributed across this nation. Six point two billion oxycodones. Not

818
00:48:14,880 --> 00:48:19,280
Speaker 1: even the OxyContin. Rather, it is not even the second

819
00:48:19,360 --> 00:48:24,680
Speaker 1: most prevalent. The second most prevalent is another version of oxycodone, percocet.

820
00:48:25,560 --> 00:48:31,040
Speaker 1: That that topped out at five billion tablets or pills

821
00:48:31,080 --> 00:48:32,359
Speaker 1: distributed in the US.

822
00:48:32,760 --> 00:48:33,800
Speaker 2: Oh my god.

823
00:48:34,040 --> 00:48:37,319
Speaker 1: People have been taking notice, you know, not just not

824
00:48:37,400 --> 00:48:41,480
Speaker 1: just us, not just a couple of reporters here and there,

825
00:48:41,719 --> 00:48:45,560
Speaker 1: but the government too. In two thousand and six, after

826
00:48:45,640 --> 00:48:50,280
Speaker 1: a four year investigation, the Justice Department and the prosecutors

827
00:48:50,719 --> 00:48:55,279
Speaker 1: recommended that three top executives at Purdue be indicted on

828
00:48:55,520 --> 00:49:01,400
Speaker 1: felony charges, including conspiracy to defraud the Unite Kid States.

829
00:49:02,760 --> 00:49:05,640
Speaker 1: And this would have resulted in prison time if these

830
00:49:05,640 --> 00:49:06,840
Speaker 1: people have been convicted.

831
00:49:07,400 --> 00:49:10,400
Speaker 2: This okay, so it just go ahead. That reminds me

832
00:49:10,560 --> 00:49:14,120
Speaker 2: of maybe the market crash of two thousand and seven,

833
00:49:14,120 --> 00:49:16,360
Speaker 2: two thousand and eight. Yeah, where all the guys in

834
00:49:16,440 --> 00:49:19,000
Speaker 2: charge were supposed to get indicted and and charged and

835
00:49:19,040 --> 00:49:19,920
Speaker 2: they'd be in trouble.

836
00:49:20,040 --> 00:49:20,560
Speaker 3: Mm hmmm.

837
00:49:20,960 --> 00:49:22,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm glad it reminds you of that.

838
00:49:22,680 --> 00:49:26,359
Speaker 2: So I'm hopefully just just like that situation, all those

839
00:49:26,360 --> 00:49:28,520
Speaker 2: guys went to prison, right, oh boy?

840
00:49:28,640 --> 00:49:34,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, So what happened was officials in the George W. H.

841
00:49:34,680 --> 00:49:39,719
Speaker 1: Bush administration did not support this prosecutorial move.

842
00:49:39,960 --> 00:49:40,240
Speaker 2: Oh.

843
00:49:40,480 --> 00:49:43,200
Speaker 1: Instead, they settled the case in two thousand and seven.

844
00:49:43,400 --> 00:49:46,360
Speaker 1: And we have a quote from a New York Times

845
00:49:46,440 --> 00:49:49,520
Speaker 1: article on this debacle.

846
00:49:49,760 --> 00:49:52,960
Speaker 2: Some would call it Prdue Pharma pleaded guilty to a

847
00:49:53,000 --> 00:49:56,640
Speaker 2: felony charge of misbranding and oxyconton while marketing the drug

848
00:49:56,680 --> 00:49:59,840
Speaker 2: by misrepresenting, among other things, it's risk of addiction and

849
00:50:00,000 --> 00:50:03,080
Speaker 2: potential to be abused. So there were three executives, the

850
00:50:03,120 --> 00:50:06,880
Speaker 2: company's chief executive, Michael Friedman, it's top medical officer, doctor

851
00:50:06,960 --> 00:50:10,600
Speaker 2: Paul D. Goldenheim, and mister Udell, a gentleman who died

852
00:50:10,640 --> 00:50:13,400
Speaker 2: in twenty thirteen. All of these guys pleaded guilty to

853
00:50:13,600 --> 00:50:18,799
Speaker 2: misdemeanor misbranding. Yeah, and it solely held them liable as

854
00:50:18,880 --> 00:50:24,839
Speaker 2: purdues Purdue pharmas responsible executives and did not accuse them

855
00:50:24,920 --> 00:50:26,440
Speaker 2: of any wrongdoing.

856
00:50:26,440 --> 00:50:28,600
Speaker 1: And the company had to pay.

857
00:50:28,719 --> 00:50:28,919
Speaker 2: Oh.

858
00:50:29,000 --> 00:50:33,040
Speaker 1: Along with the executives paid six hundred and thirty four

859
00:50:33,080 --> 00:50:36,719
Speaker 1: point five million dollars in fines, and although they did

860
00:50:36,760 --> 00:50:39,960
Speaker 1: not go to jail, they were required to perform get

861
00:50:40,000 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 1: this community service.

862
00:50:42,480 --> 00:50:43,400
Speaker 2: No member.

863
00:50:43,520 --> 00:50:47,080
Speaker 1: By the way, the prosecutors did not accuse any Sackler

864
00:50:47,160 --> 00:50:49,160
Speaker 1: family members of wrongdoing.

865
00:50:49,360 --> 00:50:51,200
Speaker 4: Let's just remember that, you know, six hundred and thirty

866
00:50:51,239 --> 00:50:54,680
Speaker 4: four mill seems like a ton of cash, but this

867
00:50:54,800 --> 00:50:57,440
Speaker 4: family is worth upwards of thirteen bill.

868
00:50:57,360 --> 00:51:01,040
Speaker 2: Well and at the time the breaking in about one

869
00:51:01,120 --> 00:51:05,800
Speaker 2: point six billion dollars a year with their farm industry.

870
00:51:05,840 --> 00:51:07,920
Speaker 1: So it's like with banking regulation, is that just the

871
00:51:07,960 --> 00:51:09,479
Speaker 1: cost of doing business at this point?

872
00:51:09,719 --> 00:51:12,040
Speaker 2: I mean, it's a huge cost. It's like over one

873
00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:14,320
Speaker 2: third of your your cost of doing business.

874
00:51:14,400 --> 00:51:18,680
Speaker 1: But still, but those payments are negotiable too. It's essentially

875
00:51:18,760 --> 00:51:22,560
Speaker 1: a layaway payment plan or they can they can appeal

876
00:51:23,080 --> 00:51:26,759
Speaker 1: that and see what they did make a settlement. Yes,

877
00:51:26,840 --> 00:51:28,960
Speaker 1: that's the problem. So they are on the hook some

878
00:51:29,040 --> 00:51:32,359
Speaker 1: how to pay it. But once that stuff gets out

879
00:51:32,400 --> 00:51:35,279
Speaker 1: of the news, you would be surprised how amenable both

880
00:51:35,320 --> 00:51:37,280
Speaker 1: parties can be behind the scenes.

881
00:51:37,320 --> 00:51:40,560
Speaker 4: And yet, Ben, if I get a parking ticket, I

882
00:51:40,600 --> 00:51:43,680
Speaker 4: gotta pay that thing in full. Yeah, or any kind

883
00:51:43,719 --> 00:51:47,120
Speaker 4: of moving violation or misdemean whatever it might be. Like,

884
00:51:47,400 --> 00:51:50,560
Speaker 4: I've been the court only for parking and traffic stuff,

885
00:51:50,880 --> 00:51:53,720
Speaker 4: but you have to pay it before you leave unless

886
00:51:53,760 --> 00:51:57,760
Speaker 4: you give some kind of crazy mitigating circumstances.

887
00:51:58,000 --> 00:52:00,720
Speaker 2: You know your your local government appreciates it's your business.

888
00:52:00,800 --> 00:52:02,920
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, that's how it feels. But it's so crazy

889
00:52:02,920 --> 00:52:05,879
Speaker 4: to me thinking about the back room scenarios that would

890
00:52:05,920 --> 00:52:09,759
Speaker 4: go into scheduling payments for an astronomical amount like this

891
00:52:09,840 --> 00:52:12,319
Speaker 4: when the company can totally afford it. I don't know,

892
00:52:12,360 --> 00:52:14,919
Speaker 4: it's just rubs me the wrong way.

893
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:17,239
Speaker 2: Sacklers.

894
00:52:18,320 --> 00:52:23,440
Speaker 1: And there's a pretty interesting anecdote that I think you

895
00:52:23,600 --> 00:52:27,000
Speaker 1: found though, about protest with Purdue and the Sacklers.

896
00:52:27,080 --> 00:52:29,759
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think we've talked about this on another episode previously,

897
00:52:29,800 --> 00:52:31,560
Speaker 4: but I think this is a really nice way to

898
00:52:31,600 --> 00:52:36,640
Speaker 4: tie this thing up. Earlier this year, an art gallery

899
00:52:36,680 --> 00:52:40,920
Speaker 4: owner in Connecticut got arrested after he placed an enormous

900
00:52:40,920 --> 00:52:44,640
Speaker 4: sculpture of a heroin spoon. You might have seen this

901
00:52:44,719 --> 00:52:47,000
Speaker 4: in movies. So you take a spoon and you bend

902
00:52:47,040 --> 00:52:49,120
Speaker 4: it backwards on top of itself so that you can

903
00:52:49,160 --> 00:52:51,880
Speaker 4: take the powdered heroin. You place it in the spoon,

904
00:52:51,920 --> 00:52:55,560
Speaker 4: and you light a match or a lighter or a candle,

905
00:52:55,760 --> 00:52:58,399
Speaker 4: and it boils it up or burn. You put water

906
00:52:58,440 --> 00:53:01,200
Speaker 4: in it and it becomes an inject double substance as

907
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:03,880
Speaker 4: opposed to a powder and this notion of being addicted,

908
00:53:04,080 --> 00:53:07,080
Speaker 4: it's kind of an icon of addiction to heroin, very specifically.

909
00:53:07,320 --> 00:53:12,319
Speaker 4: So this gallery owner placed an enormous sculpture of one

910
00:53:12,320 --> 00:53:16,080
Speaker 4: of these heroin spoons right outside in the walkway of

911
00:53:16,160 --> 00:53:21,080
Speaker 4: the home office of Purdue Pharma in Stanford, Connecticut. And Yeah,

912
00:53:21,320 --> 00:53:25,080
Speaker 4: the owner of the gallery was named Fernando Luis Alvarez,

913
00:53:25,480 --> 00:53:28,840
Speaker 4: and he collaborated with a Boston based artist named Dominique

914
00:53:28,920 --> 00:53:32,520
Speaker 4: Esposito to commission this piece, and he has a great

915
00:53:32,640 --> 00:53:35,120
Speaker 4: quote here, Ben if you shouldn't mind.

916
00:53:35,280 --> 00:53:38,680
Speaker 1: He told Time magazine, the justice department in the country

917
00:53:38,760 --> 00:53:41,880
Speaker 1: has to start putting some of these people behind bars

918
00:53:42,120 --> 00:53:44,280
Speaker 1: because they go on and make a lot of money

919
00:53:44,320 --> 00:53:46,720
Speaker 1: and then they pay a fine and so be it

920
00:53:46,760 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 1: as just not the way it should be. And he

921
00:53:50,080 --> 00:53:51,440
Speaker 1: got charged by the police, I.

922
00:53:51,400 --> 00:53:57,160
Speaker 4: Think, yeah, for obstruction of free passage. It wasn't even

923
00:53:57,200 --> 00:54:00,360
Speaker 4: in traffic, it was a footpath, and also for infering

924
00:54:00,400 --> 00:54:03,040
Speaker 4: with the police after he refused to remove the sculpture,

925
00:54:03,680 --> 00:54:06,319
Speaker 4: and it sounds like he's going to be charged, you know,

926
00:54:06,400 --> 00:54:09,000
Speaker 4: whatever goes along with those misdemeanor violations, and also the

927
00:54:09,080 --> 00:54:11,319
Speaker 4: cost of removing it because it looks like it was

928
00:54:11,400 --> 00:54:15,040
Speaker 4: like bolted down to the concrete. So he's probably gonna

929
00:54:15,040 --> 00:54:17,880
Speaker 4: have to pay some fees to patch up the sidewalk

930
00:54:17,880 --> 00:54:20,200
Speaker 4: where he put it in. And removal of this thing

931
00:54:20,239 --> 00:54:22,200
Speaker 4: would be no joke because it's it's about ten and

932
00:54:22,239 --> 00:54:25,160
Speaker 4: a half feet long, and they had to, you know,

933
00:54:25,200 --> 00:54:29,279
Speaker 4: the city government I guess or law enforcement had to

934
00:54:29,320 --> 00:54:32,120
Speaker 4: remove it and also store it. So you know, this

935
00:54:32,120 --> 00:54:34,720
Speaker 4: guy's going to get pretty hefty fine for that. Whatever

936
00:54:34,800 --> 00:54:35,560
Speaker 4: they assess.

937
00:54:36,239 --> 00:54:41,520
Speaker 1: However, we are a pretty resourceful team conspiracy realists. If

938
00:54:41,520 --> 00:54:43,160
Speaker 1: you're listening to this, you happen to be in the

939
00:54:43,239 --> 00:54:46,800
Speaker 1: area and you practice law, why not accept his payment

940
00:54:47,120 --> 00:54:52,200
Speaker 1: that gigantic sculpture, get the guy out of out of court,

941
00:54:52,239 --> 00:54:56,680
Speaker 1: and then plant it back. I love there is. We're

942
00:54:56,680 --> 00:55:01,720
Speaker 1: going a little bit long on today's episode because, first

943
00:55:01,760 --> 00:55:04,840
Speaker 1: because this is incredibly important and it doesn't matter what

944
00:55:04,920 --> 00:55:07,279
Speaker 1: your personal beliefs are. The numbers are real and they

945
00:55:07,320 --> 00:55:11,680
Speaker 1: have no opinion. There's something else we wanted to mention

946
00:55:11,760 --> 00:55:14,319
Speaker 1: that we were talking about with our super producer Paul,

947
00:55:14,360 --> 00:55:17,560
Speaker 1: who bought up a great point. This is obviously not

948
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:20,280
Speaker 1: only is it not the first opium crisis in the world,

949
00:55:20,640 --> 00:55:24,279
Speaker 1: it's not the first drug crisis in the US. In

950
00:55:24,520 --> 00:55:28,359
Speaker 1: the eighties, there was the crack cocaine epidemic, and the

951
00:55:28,400 --> 00:55:33,760
Speaker 1: government handled it in a very different way. They didn't

952
00:55:34,360 --> 00:55:37,880
Speaker 1: they didn't say, let's sort of soft foot around on

953
00:55:37,920 --> 00:55:43,120
Speaker 1: a federal level holding pharmaceutical companies responsible. Right because all

954
00:55:43,200 --> 00:55:45,560
Speaker 1: the powerful legislation for this stuff, we should say, is

955
00:55:45,560 --> 00:55:48,719
Speaker 1: coming state by state, and we can tell you a

956
00:55:48,760 --> 00:55:51,200
Speaker 1: little bit more about that later. But what they did

957
00:55:51,239 --> 00:55:54,719
Speaker 1: instead in the War on drugs was add things like

958
00:55:54,840 --> 00:55:59,120
Speaker 1: mandatory sentencing, add things like three strike laws for stuff

959
00:56:00,120 --> 00:56:03,400
Speaker 1: relatively innocuous like possession, not even with intent to destroy,

960
00:56:03,600 --> 00:56:08,120
Speaker 1: for the end user, for the end user, not the supplier,

961
00:56:08,400 --> 00:56:14,719
Speaker 1: someone who was addicted to smoking crack is probably not

962
00:56:15,440 --> 00:56:21,520
Speaker 1: also pressuring lobbyists right to let the market cocaine more effectively.

963
00:56:22,200 --> 00:56:25,920
Speaker 1: So one of the huge differences here that you can

964
00:56:25,960 --> 00:56:29,560
Speaker 1: also see in various news articles such as MPRS why

965
00:56:29,600 --> 00:56:35,680
Speaker 1: is the opioid epidemic overwhelmingly white? Some of the really

966
00:56:36,920 --> 00:56:40,520
Speaker 1: i would say revelatory media research in this thing is

967
00:56:40,760 --> 00:56:44,120
Speaker 1: tracing it to the demographic of the end user. Right,

968
00:56:44,320 --> 00:56:49,360
Speaker 1: because crack cocaine's user base was portrayed as predominantly people

969
00:56:49,360 --> 00:56:54,439
Speaker 1: of color, and the opioid epidemic is portrayed predominantly as

970
00:56:54,640 --> 00:56:55,200
Speaker 1: white people.

971
00:56:56,520 --> 00:56:58,799
Speaker 2: It's a really I mean, it's an unfortunate point. And

972
00:56:59,000 --> 00:57:02,280
Speaker 2: just see you can see how it's shaped the entire

973
00:57:02,719 --> 00:57:06,080
Speaker 2: both of the entire processes. One thing we do have

974
00:57:06,120 --> 00:57:08,440
Speaker 2: to point out here is that the crack cocaine epidemic

975
00:57:08,600 --> 00:57:14,920
Speaker 2: is illegal substance, solely pedaled illegally, right, there's no legal

976
00:57:15,040 --> 00:57:19,360
Speaker 2: prescription version of cocaine or crack cocaine now, and in

977
00:57:19,400 --> 00:57:22,640
Speaker 2: this case, I think it's kind of the same point

978
00:57:22,640 --> 00:57:25,760
Speaker 2: you're making, Ben. In this case, you've got somehow the

979
00:57:25,840 --> 00:57:28,919
Speaker 2: same illegal substance change just enough that it can become

980
00:57:28,960 --> 00:57:31,200
Speaker 2: a product that can be sold legally.

981
00:57:31,360 --> 00:57:34,400
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think they that takeaway here is the money.

982
00:57:34,800 --> 00:57:38,160
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, there's also there's also an interesting thing in

983
00:57:38,200 --> 00:57:42,560
Speaker 1: this article that is profoundly disturbing, and it goes back

984
00:57:42,560 --> 00:57:49,520
Speaker 1: into stereotypes. Medical professionals have patients based on what they

985
00:57:49,600 --> 00:57:54,080
Speaker 1: perceive the patient's identity to be. There's a drug abuse

986
00:57:54,120 --> 00:57:57,320
Speaker 1: expert in this interview on NPR named doctor Andrew Koalagny

987
00:57:57,840 --> 00:58:03,040
Speaker 1: apologies if I'm mispronouncing your name, doctor, and Colodeney notes

988
00:58:03,200 --> 00:58:06,720
Speaker 1: that one thing he's seeing is that doctors tend to

989
00:58:06,920 --> 00:58:11,840
Speaker 1: prescribe is a quote here, doctors tend to prescribe narcotics

990
00:58:11,880 --> 00:58:16,080
Speaker 1: more cautiously to their non white patients because it seems

991
00:58:16,080 --> 00:58:21,919
Speaker 1: that doctors themselves have stereotypes about addiction. So really, yeah,

992
00:58:22,320 --> 00:58:27,840
Speaker 1: so that that sort of racially based or motivated attitude

993
00:58:27,880 --> 00:58:30,800
Speaker 1: on the part of the medical professional may be playing

994
00:58:30,840 --> 00:58:31,479
Speaker 1: a role too.

995
00:58:32,000 --> 00:58:32,440
Speaker 2: Geez.

996
00:58:32,760 --> 00:58:35,240
Speaker 4: There's an interesting analog or with something that's going on

997
00:58:35,280 --> 00:58:37,840
Speaker 4: in the news right now. Matt. You mentioned the difference

998
00:58:37,840 --> 00:58:40,000
Speaker 4: between or one of the differences in the way that

999
00:58:40,120 --> 00:58:43,360
Speaker 4: the government handled it is the fact that heroin and opiates,

1000
00:58:43,400 --> 00:58:45,840
Speaker 4: there's a legal version of it that you can be prescribed.

1001
00:58:46,160 --> 00:58:50,000
Speaker 4: No analog exists for crack cocaine or cocaine what have.

1002
00:58:49,960 --> 00:58:51,360
Speaker 2: You, since they took it out of cocaine.

1003
00:58:51,400 --> 00:58:53,120
Speaker 4: So they took you out of coca cola. And you know,

1004
00:58:53,320 --> 00:58:56,160
Speaker 4: Mommy's little helpers or whatever. Right, And I've talked about

1005
00:58:56,160 --> 00:58:58,280
Speaker 4: this before, and it's just interesting because it really is

1006
00:58:58,320 --> 00:59:01,520
Speaker 4: an ongoing story. There is what's what's kind of built

1007
00:59:01,560 --> 00:59:04,920
Speaker 4: as an herbal supplement called kratom. It's a it's a

1008
00:59:04,960 --> 00:59:08,280
Speaker 4: crowned up leaf from a tree that's indigenous to like

1009
00:59:08,320 --> 00:59:11,680
Speaker 4: Malaysia or some somewhere Thailand. That's that's correct, And it

1010
00:59:11,720 --> 00:59:14,200
Speaker 4: has been on the DEA's watch list for a long

1011
00:59:14,280 --> 00:59:19,960
Speaker 4: time now because it has supposedly analog analogous sensations and

1012
00:59:19,960 --> 00:59:24,000
Speaker 4: effects to opioids, and a lot of people take it,

1013
00:59:24,200 --> 00:59:25,720
Speaker 4: and there's a whole you know, it's it's it's a

1014
00:59:25,720 --> 00:59:29,120
Speaker 4: billion dollar industry and there's all like an organization that

1015
00:59:29,240 --> 00:59:32,760
Speaker 4: is like the advocate for this substance, and people say

1016
00:59:32,800 --> 00:59:36,160
Speaker 4: how they take it to get off of prescription painkillers

1017
00:59:36,480 --> 00:59:39,040
Speaker 4: or to treat some of the things that prescription pills

1018
00:59:39,080 --> 00:59:41,600
Speaker 4: would be, you know, prescribed for and what have you.

1019
00:59:41,600 --> 00:59:44,160
Speaker 4: And then of course there is also a people take

1020
00:59:44,200 --> 00:59:46,480
Speaker 4: it for anxiety, what have you. But there's also potential

1021
00:59:46,520 --> 00:59:50,760
Speaker 4: for abuse. But the latest is that the DEA is

1022
00:59:50,840 --> 00:59:53,400
Speaker 4: finally really cracking down on it, and it looks like

1023
00:59:53,440 --> 00:59:57,840
Speaker 4: they may make it federally illegal sooner rather than later.

1024
00:59:57,960 --> 00:59:59,640
Speaker 1: I meaned it, schedule it.

1025
00:59:59,480 --> 01:00:00,760
Speaker 4: Make it one.

1026
01:00:01,280 --> 01:00:01,720
Speaker 1: Wow.

1027
01:00:01,720 --> 01:00:03,720
Speaker 4: Can you know how many deaths have been attributed to

1028
01:00:03,720 --> 01:00:04,240
Speaker 4: this substance?

1029
01:00:04,320 --> 01:00:07,240
Speaker 1: Roughly zero thirty thirty And.

1030
01:00:07,240 --> 01:00:09,120
Speaker 4: I don't know the details about that, But how many

1031
01:00:09,160 --> 01:00:12,040
Speaker 4: deaths did we say we're attributed to prescription painkillers?

1032
01:00:12,120 --> 01:00:12,800
Speaker 1: Thousands?

1033
01:00:13,160 --> 01:00:15,760
Speaker 4: So why is the attitude so different? Why is this

1034
01:00:15,960 --> 01:00:19,920
Speaker 4: substance on the chopping block, and yet the others that

1035
01:00:19,960 --> 01:00:22,840
Speaker 4: we have massive amounts of data that show it is

1036
01:00:22,880 --> 01:00:26,560
Speaker 4: in fact deadly are not. I think it comes down

1037
01:00:26,560 --> 01:00:31,160
Speaker 4: to Big Pharma is pissed that this legal substance that

1038
01:00:31,200 --> 01:00:33,040
Speaker 4: you can buy in head shops and online or what

1039
01:00:33,120 --> 01:00:36,560
Speaker 4: have you is potentially taking away taking money out of

1040
01:00:36,560 --> 01:00:37,040
Speaker 4: their pocket.

1041
01:00:37,240 --> 01:00:41,240
Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to. I think that's a fantastic point.

1042
01:00:41,280 --> 01:00:43,640
Speaker 1: I want to go back, though, make sure we don't

1043
01:00:43,680 --> 01:00:47,400
Speaker 1: miss the point with what this doctor was saying about

1044
01:00:47,440 --> 01:00:50,240
Speaker 1: the way we handle these epidemics. And I think they

1045
01:00:50,280 --> 01:00:56,800
Speaker 1: tie in because in the doctor Kladney was saying that

1046
01:00:57,240 --> 01:01:01,800
Speaker 1: in this epidemic where we do see these legal analogs,

1047
01:01:02,760 --> 01:01:07,080
Speaker 1: he's saying, we're hearing from policymakers, even conservative politicians, when

1048
01:01:07,080 --> 01:01:09,600
Speaker 1: they talk about the crisis, they begin by saying, we

1049
01:01:09,680 --> 01:01:13,040
Speaker 1: cannot arrest our way out of this. We can see

1050
01:01:13,080 --> 01:01:16,080
Speaker 1: that people who are addicted can access effective treatment. We

1051
01:01:16,120 --> 01:01:18,840
Speaker 1: did not hear that during the crack cocaine epidemic. It's

1052
01:01:18,840 --> 01:01:20,720
Speaker 1: good that we're hearing it now, but it's too bad

1053
01:01:20,760 --> 01:01:24,880
Speaker 1: we didn't hear it then. And if kretom is a

1054
01:01:25,040 --> 01:01:29,280
Speaker 1: possible way to help people in need, then it seems

1055
01:01:29,720 --> 01:01:33,960
Speaker 1: just objectively, it seems pretty counterintuitive to remove that from

1056
01:01:33,960 --> 01:01:34,600
Speaker 1: the conversation.

1057
01:01:34,720 --> 01:01:37,840
Speaker 4: Absolutely, I didn't mean to derail the racial tones to

1058
01:01:37,920 --> 01:01:41,040
Speaker 4: this comparison. I think that is absolutely accurate. I think

1059
01:01:41,080 --> 01:01:43,440
Speaker 4: this is almost It just really goes to show that

1060
01:01:43,480 --> 01:01:48,400
Speaker 4: there is not only that bias in place in this discussion,

1061
01:01:48,600 --> 01:01:53,320
Speaker 4: but also that whole lining of the pockets. Absolutely element

1062
01:01:53,560 --> 01:01:54,840
Speaker 4: I think there is hand in hand.

1063
01:01:55,040 --> 01:01:58,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, well here's the thing. Does cretum then do you

1064
01:01:58,080 --> 01:02:02,120
Speaker 2: get kreatum clinics like method own clinics and are addicted

1065
01:02:02,200 --> 01:02:04,160
Speaker 2: to said there's potential for abuse.

1066
01:02:04,600 --> 01:02:06,560
Speaker 4: That's here's what the DEA has to say about this.

1067
01:02:07,080 --> 01:02:10,000
Speaker 4: One of their big beefs is that it's being supposedly

1068
01:02:10,120 --> 01:02:14,680
Speaker 4: marketed for those things that I mentioned earlier, withdrawal from opiates,

1069
01:02:15,560 --> 01:02:19,360
Speaker 4: treating things that would require a more professional medical opinion,

1070
01:02:19,600 --> 01:02:22,280
Speaker 4: et cetera. Supposedly, they say it's being marketed that way.

1071
01:02:22,560 --> 01:02:24,880
Speaker 4: So it says, quote, the FDA knows people are using

1072
01:02:24,880 --> 01:02:27,280
Speaker 4: Creative to treat conditions like pain, anxiety, and depression, which

1073
01:02:27,280 --> 01:02:30,120
Speaker 4: are serious medical conditions that require proper diagnosis and oversight

1074
01:02:30,160 --> 01:02:32,400
Speaker 4: from a licensed health care provider. We also know that

1075
01:02:32,400 --> 01:02:36,200
Speaker 4: the substance is being actively marketed and distributed for these purposes. Importantly,

1076
01:02:36,280 --> 01:02:39,160
Speaker 4: evidence shows that creative has similar effects to narcotics like

1077
01:02:39,240 --> 01:02:42,360
Speaker 4: opioids and carry similar risks of abuse, addiction, and in

1078
01:02:42,400 --> 01:02:45,600
Speaker 4: some cases death. But then you have people that use

1079
01:02:45,640 --> 01:02:48,800
Speaker 4: it and talk about it very openly that a part

1080
01:02:48,840 --> 01:02:52,160
Speaker 4: of these organizations that say it's just not the same

1081
01:02:52,240 --> 01:02:54,160
Speaker 4: that they were able to use it because as a

1082
01:02:54,160 --> 01:02:58,440
Speaker 4: similar effect to narcotics, but that they it literally allowed

1083
01:02:58,480 --> 01:03:00,280
Speaker 4: them to kind of integrate back into society in a

1084
01:03:00,280 --> 01:03:02,560
Speaker 4: way that is weren't able to do with the narcotics

1085
01:03:02,560 --> 01:03:04,320
Speaker 4: that they were on, the heavy doses of narcotics.

1086
01:03:04,360 --> 01:03:08,400
Speaker 1: So MDMA and PTSD.

1087
01:03:08,120 --> 01:03:12,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, what we need is a prescription version that we

1088
01:03:12,520 --> 01:03:16,480
Speaker 2: can sell for eighty dollars a tablet and then it's

1089
01:03:16,480 --> 01:03:16,920
Speaker 2: good to go.

1090
01:03:17,240 --> 01:03:20,360
Speaker 1: No cures, only treatments, you.

1091
01:03:20,400 --> 01:03:23,080
Speaker 2: Know, I know, we're wrapping up. We're going way too long. Sure,

1092
01:03:23,880 --> 01:03:26,240
Speaker 2: we didn't even really get into the fentanyl thing that's

1093
01:03:26,240 --> 01:03:28,360
Speaker 2: happening right now as part of the crisis. Like the

1094
01:03:28,440 --> 01:03:31,560
Speaker 2: reason why so many people are dying right now today

1095
01:03:31,600 --> 01:03:34,840
Speaker 2: while we're recording this because the heroin supply that is

1096
01:03:34,880 --> 01:03:38,080
Speaker 2: illegal that people are getting rather than the prescription drugs,

1097
01:03:38,320 --> 01:03:41,160
Speaker 2: is laced with this thing that's deadly in very very

1098
01:03:41,280 --> 01:03:42,440
Speaker 2: very small doses.

1099
01:03:43,040 --> 01:03:44,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, can you tell us a little bit about that.

1100
01:03:44,760 --> 01:03:48,480
Speaker 2: Well, it's just a fact fentanyl is a drug that's

1101
01:03:48,520 --> 01:03:52,320
Speaker 2: being laced within supplies of heroin coming into the United States,

1102
01:03:52,680 --> 01:03:56,720
Speaker 2: and it maybe it's a whole different episode for another

1103
01:03:56,720 --> 01:03:59,720
Speaker 2: show where we talk about like why is that happening?

1104
01:03:59,760 --> 01:04:02,480
Speaker 2: Is it just to save cost on the manufacturer's side.

1105
01:04:02,600 --> 01:04:04,680
Speaker 1: How does heroin get into the States?

1106
01:04:04,960 --> 01:04:09,040
Speaker 2: Yes? Well, yeah, and and what is the difference between

1107
01:04:09,040 --> 01:04:10,800
Speaker 2: fentanyl and all this stuff? And who would just who

1108
01:04:10,840 --> 01:04:11,880
Speaker 2: would be putting it in there?

1109
01:04:12,080 --> 01:04:15,440
Speaker 4: There's a there's a photo in this article from statnews

1110
01:04:15,520 --> 01:04:17,720
Speaker 4: dot com. The headline is why fentanyl is deadlier than

1111
01:04:17,760 --> 01:04:21,000
Speaker 4: heroin in a single photo, and it's these two inch

1112
01:04:21,360 --> 01:04:25,280
Speaker 4: tall vials. On the left is heroin and it has

1113
01:04:25,480 --> 01:04:28,000
Speaker 4: about a centimeter of powder in the bottom of it,

1114
01:04:28,120 --> 01:04:30,080
Speaker 4: and then the next to it is fentanyl. And it

1115
01:04:30,120 --> 01:04:33,920
Speaker 4: just looks like residue, Like there's like maybe ten grains

1116
01:04:34,040 --> 01:04:36,640
Speaker 4: that you can see. Wow, it looks like the leftovers

1117
01:04:36,680 --> 01:04:37,920
Speaker 4: in like a salt shaker.

1118
01:04:38,040 --> 01:04:39,320
Speaker 1: And that's an equivalent dose.

1119
01:04:39,720 --> 01:04:42,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh my god, Yeah, terrified. That's terrified.

1120
01:04:43,000 --> 01:04:46,640
Speaker 1: So maybe that is a future episode for us. Today,

1121
01:04:47,240 --> 01:04:50,640
Speaker 1: we want to thank you for thank you for taking

1122
01:04:50,720 --> 01:04:55,280
Speaker 1: this strange journey with us. It's only the beginning of

1123
01:04:55,320 --> 01:04:59,560
Speaker 1: something that has been ongoing for you know, not just

1124
01:04:59,600 --> 01:05:02,520
Speaker 1: since maybe since the nineteen nineties here in the States,

1125
01:05:02,760 --> 01:05:06,880
Speaker 1: but ongoing for thousands of years in terms of our

1126
01:05:07,000 --> 01:05:13,840
Speaker 1: species struggle with opium So, in short answer for today's question, yes,

1127
01:05:14,360 --> 01:05:17,720
Speaker 1: the opium epidemic in the US is at least partially

1128
01:05:17,800 --> 01:05:21,400
Speaker 1: the result of an active and very successful conspiracy on

1129
01:05:21,480 --> 01:05:24,240
Speaker 1: the part of pharmaceutical companies, some of them, not all

1130
01:05:24,240 --> 01:05:27,160
Speaker 1: of them, to twist the law or circumvent it entirely

1131
01:05:27,400 --> 01:05:31,800
Speaker 1: and push these painkillers on innocent patience. To biggest factors

1132
01:05:31,800 --> 01:05:35,640
Speaker 1: in this are private partnerships with politicians, with holding or

1133
01:05:35,680 --> 01:05:41,480
Speaker 1: suppressing of important information, and nowadays twenty eighteen, multiple companies

1134
01:05:41,560 --> 01:05:44,960
Speaker 1: claim they are in fact combating the crisis they or

1135
01:05:45,080 --> 01:05:48,760
Speaker 1: companies like them, did play a role in creating. None

1136
01:05:48,760 --> 01:05:51,720
Speaker 1: of these companies to date have acknowledged that they played

1137
01:05:51,720 --> 01:05:55,760
Speaker 1: this role, even when internal memos show that they consciously

1138
01:05:55,840 --> 01:05:58,480
Speaker 1: did so. It's pretty easy to see how critics don't

1139
01:05:58,520 --> 01:06:02,960
Speaker 1: trust these statements. Currently, the attorney's general of forty one

1140
01:06:03,080 --> 01:06:07,040
Speaker 1: different US states, inspired by aggressive legislation from Ohio, are

1141
01:06:07,160 --> 01:06:11,000
Speaker 1: joining forces to investigate these companies. The ultimate goal of

1142
01:06:11,040 --> 01:06:14,400
Speaker 1: these lawsuits is to force the manufacturers to change their

1143
01:06:14,440 --> 01:06:18,560
Speaker 1: marketing tactics offer better warnings as to how addictive these

1144
01:06:18,560 --> 01:06:21,920
Speaker 1: things can be. So far, all of these cases have

1145
01:06:22,040 --> 01:06:26,760
Speaker 1: been civil and not criminal, and gosh, we have war

1146
01:06:27,080 --> 01:06:29,720
Speaker 1: as a final As a final word, we want to

1147
01:06:29,720 --> 01:06:32,640
Speaker 1: hear from you. What are the consequences for these companies,

1148
01:06:32,680 --> 01:06:36,120
Speaker 1: What should they be? How can societies and grips of

1149
01:06:36,160 --> 01:06:40,640
Speaker 1: these epidemics hope to combat them. The answers have a

1150
01:06:40,680 --> 01:06:43,640
Speaker 1: wide range of approach and plausibility, but one thing is

1151
01:06:43,680 --> 01:06:46,600
Speaker 1: for sure. At the rate people are overdosing here, at

1152
01:06:46,640 --> 01:06:49,160
Speaker 1: least in our neck of the global woods, are projected

1153
01:06:49,240 --> 01:06:52,880
Speaker 1: five hundred thousand Americans could dive from opioid misuse in

1154
01:06:52,920 --> 01:06:55,960
Speaker 1: the next ten years. If you are one of the

1155
01:06:56,000 --> 01:06:59,920
Speaker 1: millions of Americans struggling within an addiction to opioid drugs,

1156
01:07:00,440 --> 01:07:03,200
Speaker 1: please reach out directly to one of the many free

1157
01:07:03,240 --> 01:07:06,320
Speaker 1: treatment centers in your area. There are numbers you can call.

1158
01:07:07,800 --> 01:07:10,840
Speaker 1: We guarantee you are worth it, and your time is

1159
01:07:10,880 --> 01:07:13,160
Speaker 1: worth it. The time of your loved ones is worth

1160
01:07:13,200 --> 01:07:16,240
Speaker 1: it as well. We'd also like to hear your story,

1161
01:07:16,320 --> 01:07:18,480
Speaker 1: and we promise we won't share it unless you give

1162
01:07:18,520 --> 01:07:20,080
Speaker 1: us the oka to do so.

1163
01:07:20,360 --> 01:07:23,320
Speaker 2: And that's the end of this classic episode. If you

1164
01:07:23,400 --> 01:07:27,480
Speaker 2: have any thoughts or questions about this episode, you can

1165
01:07:27,520 --> 01:07:30,120
Speaker 2: get into contact with us in a number of different ways.

1166
01:07:30,320 --> 01:07:31,880
Speaker 2: One of the best is to give us a call.

1167
01:07:31,920 --> 01:07:36,760
Speaker 2: Our number is one eight three three STDWYTK. If you

1168
01:07:36,760 --> 01:07:38,640
Speaker 2: don't want to do that, you can send us a

1169
01:07:38,640 --> 01:07:39,800
Speaker 2: good old fashioned email.

1170
01:07:40,080 --> 01:07:44,200
Speaker 1: We are conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.

1171
01:07:44,360 --> 01:07:46,440
Speaker 2: Stuff they don't want you to know. Is a production

1172
01:07:46,560 --> 01:07:51,080
Speaker 2: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

1173
01:07:51,160 --> 01:07:54,040
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.