" 'We must appreciate that severe constant pain will destroy the morale of the sturdiest individual. . . But . . . we are often loathe to give liberal amounts of narcotics because the drug addiction itself may become a hideous spectacle,' surgeon Warren Cole wrote 60 years ago in a small book on cancer pain."
-- "The Ongoing Opioid Prescription Epidemic: Historical Context" by Meldrum
What is interesting about all my research into the opioid epidemic (yet another research paper due in Engl 201A) is the fact that no one can explain how these overdose deaths are occurring. I've overdosed on opioids twice--once with hydrocodone (and a very large amount of Tylenol) and then again years later with tramadol (also taken with lithium). I didn't die (although I have to admit if you are going to kill yourself, taking a bunch of codeine or morphine is one of the better ways). What I'm curious about is how many people are accidentally overdosing and how many people are doing it with the sole purpose of dying. Those are two vastly different problems.
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