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Comment by boh | Hacker News Reader

Oxycontin was legal, how well did that go?

It’s not clear to me that making it legal was the problem. The marketing was catastrophic. The amount of messaging, in doctors’ offices and otherwise, about using long-acting painkillers, getting ahead of the pain, making sure your pain was treated, etc was ridiculous.

Nowadays, the messaging is quite different. And we’re starting to learn that the opioids may not even work for the things people like using them for, regardless of how dangerous they are:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

Yes, that’s an RCT with oxycodone users reporting more pain after 6 weeks compared to placebo.

I'm sure the marketing for legalized Meth will be more responsible (just like it is for everything else that isn't good for us).

What is the compulsion to find some tiny fragment of an argument to go against the obvious? Maybe it's because you'd need an absolutely idealized scenario to take legalizing drug use seriously.

You know those countries that legalized drugs? Feel free to look up how well that's going.

Well, legalized meth is essentially ritalin/adderall (not exactly the same thing, but same class)

Thankfully those have posed absolutely zero problems so I guess we should legalize meth.

I didn't say that, just pointing out that a lot of these illegal drugs have already legal analogs that are quite similar in chemical composition. (If I were to make an argument here, it'd be more along the lines that we're overdiagnosing ADHD and overprescribing stimulants)

If you had any experience with this at all you would realize how profoundly ignorant it is to conflate the downstream effects of meth with adderall. Anyone reading this please please do not make this mistake.

I know some people that are (former) meth addicts, and you know where they got their start? I'll give you a hint, it happened when the doctors stopped prescribing their ADHD meds or they wanted a higher dose. Just sayin'

> I'm sure the marketing for legalized Meth will be more responsible

Doctors already know how those work, and we don't have to allow marketing them.

We should stop all the current Meth marketing...that'll solve the addiction problem for sure.

What are all these scenarios where policy makers have absolute control of how drugs are sold and consumed? Meth is illegal, as in we don't allow "marketing" today. But if it was legal, it'll only be the marketing that will be the potential problem? What is the point of these arguments? The low enforcement/legalization options have been tried in various places in various ways, not one has gone well. Besides magical thinking, what is the actual argument that legalizing drugs makes it less of a problem?

Marketing of legal prescription drugs can be restricted in certain ways, but it has to be allowed unless we modify the First Amendment. Freedom of expression is a fundamental right and can't be casually eliminated just because we don't like the results.

Marketing is restricted, regulated and outright banned for a number of products and services.

Is that the overwhelming opinion of legal scholars?

I think I would be just fine with a change like that. If sales of a product can be restricted, why should advertising for that product need to be unrestricted?

It doesn't feel to me like advertising is more of a fundamental right than engaging in sales.

Advertisements for prescription drugs are very heavily restricted in the US. And, as far as I know, companies selling prescription drugs may not encourage doctors to use them arbitrarily.

I don’t know whether anyone has ever tested the constitutionality of the relevant laws and regulations, but they exist and are enforced.

You seem to be entirely missing my point. Methamphetamine, like oxycodone, is legal, right now, in the US. Here it is:

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2017/00...

I don’t, and never have, seen posters in doctors’ offices suggesting that patients get ahead of their symptoms (of hunger? sleepiness? distraction?) by taking prescription meth. And I’ve never heard any suggestion that the high incidence of methamphetamine is caused by its legality.

Oxycontin is still legal, as is methamphetamine (Desoxyn) and cocaine (Numbrino). They can all be legally prescribed by a physician, although as DEA scheduled controlled substances they are subject to tight restrictions.

The issue with Oxycontin (and related opioid painkillers) wasn't the legal status. It was over prescription triggered by a range of unethical actions by pharmaceutical companies (mainly Purdue Pharma) plus some doctors who took advantage of the situation.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-announces-...

It's hilarious they likely spent thousands of hours work-shopping and testing a whole bunch of names and ultimately went with Numbrino.

I think that's a different context, because doctors were heavily encouraged to overprescribe it and it was marketed as non-addictive.

You can blame capitalism for the problems due to Oxy…

And Communism for problems due to Fentanyl? Drug abuse is politically agnostic.

Incorrect. The literal capital owners used the fucking market to push the sale of these drugs. So much so they caused a problem they now profit off the fix for…

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