One unhappy thing here is the number of heroin ODs. My big question is how does this much H get here? You are talking a LOT of dope. Local cops seem to be unable to stop the influx. Isn't there some way to get a handle on the importation?
One unhappy thing here is the number of heroin ODs. My big question is how does this much H get here? You are talking a LOT of dope. Local cops seem to be unable to stop the influx. Isn't there some way to get a handle on the importation?
It gets here the same way it did during Vietnam, military movements in and out of the middle east. At least, it sure looks that way to me. Remember, before we had boots on the ground in Afghanistan the Taliban had completely eliminated poppy production in the region, then we showed up and opium and opiates exploded world wide. Of course, the CIA would never import drugs from another country to fund their projects, wink wink nudge nudge. They didn't do it with heroin in the 70s, cocaine in the 80s, or anything like that. And they would never use American civilians to test drugs or as science experiments, not the CIA.
The local cops here have quit trying. Junkies seem to be above the law now, and overdosing just gets you brought back to life at no fee with no criminal charges. Even in robberies and other bad things associated with addiction "I'm a heroin addict" seems to be a free pass out of jail to a rehab facility then back on the streets, back into the cycle again.
Maybe I'm completely wrong and there is just a massive extremely well connected international distributor at play that can move tons of product and money across borders with no one noticing, but I think my theory has weight and history behind it.
most of the poppies used to come from Afghanistan, then south east Asia became a major producer Burma, Laos, Burnei, Myanmar, Timor, Thailand and Bangladesh. How Thailand gets a pass from the west on it's role in illegal human and drug trafficking is baffling to me. Having worked in narcotics enforcement with agents at the federal level, many have a theory on transport that goes beyond the traditonal shipping route that flows through golden triangle.
RevRico wrote: Maybe I'm completely wrong and there is just a massive extremely well connected international distributor at play that can move tons of product and money across borders with no one noticing, but I think my theory has weight and history behind it.
You're part wrong. Industrial-scale drug smuggling is a real thing, where a criminal organization (which is usually also a legit company!) will pay off the right people to bring in a container-load of undisguised drugs. Gangs and small fries strap them to people, hide them inside things etc.
In reply to RevRico:
not the CIA, and not the United States government, but there are several governments behind the transport that circumvents the golden triangle. It's their revenge and counter punch to the cold war.
I need to watch some Lethal Weapon tonight. 
In reply to GameboyRMH:
I'm just looking at street level prices being what they are.
Heroin used to be like cocaine, after Bayer write selling it as headache medicine. It was a rich mans drug. Now people are selling doses for less than cigarettes, for that to still be profitable, you'd be looking at multiple container ships. Not even shipping containers, but whole ships, coming in at a time.
In time, it seems most of the major cartels have CIA links that get revealed down the road. There's even talk and some flimsy evidence that Pablo Escobar himself was an agent helping to fund coupes in south America.
I feel bad for the people who are addicted and those who OD, but they willingly chose to take it the first time. I will never understand that. If there was not a seemingly inexhaustible line of stupid (or desperate) people waiting to buy it and then get hooked, the problem would go away. As far as I know nobody is being forced to get hooked on the stuff.
Some try to blame the crackdown on prescription pain killers as the cause for the recent surge in Heroin. There is also the Afghanistan issue where we use our military to guard the poppy fields that the Taliban used to destroy. Whatever the reasons, it is a sad problem that seems to only be getting worse.
T.J. wrote: I feel bad for the people who are addicted and those who OD, but they willingly chose to take it the first time. I will never understand that.
Not exactly. It's worth considering that doctors in the US are handing out opiate painkillers like candy these days, which is what kicked off this epidemic.
Damn the trailing 'e' missing from the title.
In reply to GameboyRMH:
I still don't understand. If you are addicted to Oxycontin and can no longer get it, instead of moving to something worse that will kill you, maybe you should move to getting clean. I don't understand, but I guess there is no logic when it comes to addiction.
T.J. wrote: In reply to GameboyRMH: I still don't understand. If you are addicted to Oxycontin and can no longer get it, instead of moving to something worse that will kill you, maybe you should move to getting clean. I don't understand, but I guess there is no logic when it comes to addiction.
No there isn't. You'll just jones like hell until you get more opiates in you.
Yes, painkillers can be hard to find. Heroin (same base) is easy.
You want to know how big opioid painkiller prescription is? There are national commercials, that you can see pretty often, for another drug that treats the constipation associated with taking opioids! Heck, maybe they are getting heroin users as customers also.
T.J. wrote: In reply to GameboyRMH: I still don't understand. If you are addicted to Oxycontin and can no longer get it, instead of moving to something worse that will kill you, maybe you should move to getting clean. I don't understand, but I guess there is no logic when it comes to addiction.
If you don't understand it, you don't understand addiction.
A kid I knew from elementary school just passed away from an OD. Sad times.
In reply to T.J.:
Well, oxycontin was running 80/pill on the black market last I heard a couple years ago, heroin is selling for $2-3 a dose. It's a lot easier coming up with 10 a day than 80 multiple times a day.
Then there are things like this happening
Almost 800 million pills shipped to West Virginia by pharmaceutical companies. Most of which winds up in counties of under a million people. The numbers is pills being distributed and sold "legally"by the producers is just mind blowing.
Which is another reason I believe the theories that I do about the whole thing.
In reply to aircooled:
I raised an eyebrow at that one myself.
T.J. wrote: As far as I know nobody is being forced to get hooked on the stuff.
Don't know too many pimps, do you?
Locally (and beyond too, I don't really know) there has been a move to mixing Fentanyl into the heroin supply due to there not being enough supply to meet the demand. So just a tiny variation in concentration takes a dose from "wheeee" to fatal. And yet the junkies keep shooting up.
There have been some small towns (one just across the river from Louisville) where the HIV/AIDS rate has exploded recently from all the needle sharing. And yet the junkies keep shooting up.
Nothing we do to limit the supply seems to work but makes life for the law abiding more challenging. Now I have to prove I'm not cooking meth just to but Sudafed. I have to take a drug test before I can get a prescription for painkillers when I'm covered in road rash because there are so many drug seekers out there. It's behaviors that need to change, not hammering at the supply. You'd thing the prohibition would have taught us that.
In reply to AngryCorvair:
No I do not know any pimps.
Also, I suspect a lot of people don't even realize they are being prescribed narcotics with a high potential for addiction.
I have 3 nephews struggling with it. There lives and families are a mess. It's a popular drug in the suburban Chicago area.
Here's a good show to watch on the epidemic. It doesn't touch on how the junk is getting into the US, but it talks about the history a bit and looks at the struggles some junkies and communities have and how attempts are being made to improve the situation.
In reply to mtn:
Me: I don't understand addiction.
You: You must not understand addiction.
Me: I thought that's what I said.
I'll refrain from comment being a.) on the front line of fixing the OD's, b.) living in a depressed economic area the escapism associatied with the illegal drugs, and c.) prescriber errors in thinking that more and more are the answers.
Don't forget the govt allows this to happen to keep having "First-mas"...
I grew up in WV. The town I grew up in is being savaged by ODs, but not as bad (yet) as some of the places in the southern part of the state. It is a real mess. I have a book called 'Dreamland" about the epidemic, but haven't read it yet.
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