This past summer, I got unexpectedly sick and was given oxycodone, an opioid—an experience that put me right in the middle of a drug crisis that’s been raging for years. As someone with sickle cell disease, opioids have always been a part of my treatment protocol. Pain crises, complications like acute chest syndrome, and just general pain are a part of my chronic condition. And so are drugs.
We've all seen the overall drug crisis spiral, with fentanyl, horse tranquilizers, and even the advent of designer drugs hitting cities. As a New Yorker, it's quite normal to see opioid abuse on the streets. But as the opioid crisis has spiraled, it has become increasingly clear that neither political party is truly tackling the problem in a way that addresses both the needs of chronic pain patients and the reality of addiction.
The drug crisis in the United States has been spun into the world of partisanship as each party continues to point fingers at each other and offer no lasting, long-term solution. Fingers are being pointed everywhere but at the creators of these drugs.
The left pushes for harm reduction as a temporary solution. The focus is not to stop the crisis but rather to keep users of opioids alive with services like free needle exchanges and supervised injection sites. Harm reduction isn't a bad idea at all— it acknowledges the addictive nature of opioids and recognizes that it is a public health crisis. But it also doesn't do anything to stop the crisis either, and the root causes of why people fall into addiction aren't addressed.
The right-wing approach goes in a different direction with a useless ‘tough-on-crime’ approach that cracks down on distributors, adding more laws to criminalize use, and restricting the use of drugs. Limiting who has access to drugs can definitely prevent new addictions, but it can also sweep patients like myself who rely on these medications under the exact rug of suspicion and restriction as those struggling with addiction.
I hold Big Pharma companies like the now-defunct Purdue Pharma (who created OxyCodone) responsible. They are almost always let off the hook without significant penalties. In fact, Purdue recently enjoyed immunity from any lawsuits over the epidemic in exchange for a $6 billion settlement with the victims of the epidemic. These companies manufactured and aggressively marketed painkillers without disclosing their addictivity. Not only have politicians been useless in debating how to manage the aftermath, but they've also failed to hold these corporations responsible. And why would they?
The Sackler family of Purdue Pharma donated $116,000 to the Democratic Party in Connecticut! Corporate donations from pharmaceutical companies often flow into political campaigns on a constant basis. As those powers benefit from Big Pharma's influence, it's no wonder that meaningful reforms to address the root cause of the drug crisis in the United States remain elusive. Instead, the conversation rolls back to half-baked and awful solutions, leaving those suffering from addiction and others medically reliant on opioids with virtually no options.
The reality is that both Big Pharma and politicians have failed the American people— both those suffering from addiction and those who rely on medications for medical reasons. Politicians love to talk a big game about tackling the overall drug crisis, but few ever actually land a hit. What we need is real accountability from Big Pharma— not settlements where guilt isn't admitted. Yet, instead of acting, our politicians seem content to do nothing but twiddle their thumbs, arguing with each other.
As Big Pharma makes record profits and politicians bicker, I truly wonder who's really fighting this war on drugs.
Photo Credit: Manhattan Institute
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