Republicans and Drugs

 

As Liddle Marco gets Trumpier and Trumpier, I get angrier and angrier:

Why do you assume only racial minority communities use smoking methods to take drugs?

— Against Yastronomical Odds (@Yastreblyansky) February 8, 2022

I guess it should be clear that he does not in fact assume anything of the sort—he knows perfectly well that methamphetamine users are typically white (in proportions ranging from 54 percent in San Jose to 94 percent in Portland), with Latin users constituting a majority in Los Angeles and a substantial second place elsewhere, and crystal meth smokers, with the characteristic "meth mouth", are very much among those who can transmit diseases like hepatitis by sharing pipes and would benefit, along with the general public health, from a program distributing clean pipes. 

Rubio focuses on "minority communities" for twin reasons, to reinforce the stereotype according to which drug abuse is basically a Black problem, to make his voters confident he's not talking about them, and to suggest that the "liberals" responsible for the program he's pretending to be scandalized by are the "real racists", handing out smoking paraphernalia as if to encourage drug abuse among our Black brothers and sisters and kill them all. Of course he's also taking care not to learn too much about the program he's criticizing, or what it's intended to do.

Of course as you know full well our government is not doing that. Our government is providing addicts with safe spaces where they can access treatment and furnished with various ways of protecting their health and preventing overdoses in the meantime https://t.co/myJF971DeL

— Against Yastronomical Odds (@Yastreblyansky) February 9, 2022

The program in question is $30 million in funding under the American Rescue Plan of March 2021 (passed under reconciliation rules, with zero Republican votes) for what are called "harm reduction programs" to be run by nonprofit organizations. It's not a ton of money, for what is generally regarded as an experimental idea, based on the not-so-controversial theory that

• drug addiction is a disease which requires treatment, not punishment,
• sufferers need help and time to make up their minds to seek treatment, and
• there are ways of keeping them alive and more or less healthy while they do that.

Monday was the deadline for this year's grant applications (here is the guide to applying, from which most of the ensuing quotations come), which I presume has something to do with how it became a Republican SCANDAL this week. The official purpose of the program stops short of "curing" addiction, but rather is aimed at taking care of those who haven't made the decision to get clearn:

to support community-based overdose prevention programs, syringe services programs, and other harm reduction services. Funding will be used to enhance overdose and other types of prevention activities to help control the spread of infectious diseases and the consequences of such diseases for individuals with, or at risk of developing substance use disorders (SUD), support distribution of FDA-approved overdose reversal medication to individuals at risk of overdose, build connections for individuals at risk for, or with, a SUD to overdose education, counseling, and health education, refer individuals to treatment for infectious diseases, such as HIV, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), and viral hepatitis, and encourage such individuals to take steps to reduce the negative personal and public health impacts of substance use or misuse. This will include supporting capacity development to strengthen harm reduction programs as part of the continuum of care. Recipients will also establish processes, protocols, and mechanisms for referral to appropriate treatment and recovery support services. Grantees will also provide overdose prevention education to their target populations regarding the consumption of substances including but not limited to opioids and their synthetic analogs.

The fundamental purpose of the programs is to save lives—

Nearly 92,000 Americans died of drug overdoses in 2020, marking a 30% increase from the year before, a 75% increase over five years and by far the highest annual total on record, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Preliminary figures suggest that the 2021 death toll from overdoses may be even higher.

While overdose death rates have increased in every major demographic group in recent years, no group has seen a bigger increase than Black men. As a result, Black men have overtaken White men and are now on par with American Indian or Alaska Native men as the demographic groups most likely to die from overdoses.

and to save lives of Black men in particular, but by no means exclusively, and the means are supposed to include these "kits" including

• Harm reduction vending machine(s), including stock for machines; 
• Infectious diseases testing kits (HIV, HBV, HCV, etc.); 
• Medication lock boxes; o FDA-approved overdose reversal medication (as well as higher dosages now approved by FDA); 
•  Safe sex kits, including PrEP resources and condoms; 
• Safe smoking kits/supplies; 
• Screening for infectious diseases (HIV, sexually transmitted infections, viral hepatitis); 
• Sharps disposal and medication disposal kits; 
• Substance test kits, including test strips for fentanyl and other synthetic drugs; 
• Syringes to prevent and control the spread of infectious diseases; 
• Vaccination services (hepatitis A, hepatitis B vaccination); and 
• Wound care management supplies.

There are relatively few such programs in the US so far, presumably because the funding is hard to come by, and the evidence remains inconclusive, but the main evidence against such programs has turned out to be deeply faulty

criminologists from the University of South Wales in the United Kingdom, found that the evidence for supervised injection is not as strong as previously thought. However, after publication, this article was retracted by the journal, with the author's consent, because of "methodological weaknesses."

and the evidence in favor seems pretty robust;

In a study published in Lancet, [Canadian epidemiologist J.-B.] Milloy and other researchers found that the fatal overdose rate sharply decreased in and around the immediate area of the site. Additional evaluations from Milloy's group and the regional health ministry found that Insite averted about 50 deaths in the first three to four years of operation; that people were less likely to engage in behaviors that would lead to HIV infections; and, that those who used Insite were more likely to initiate detoxing from drugs and access treatment like methadone, compared to those who weren't using the facility.

The fentanyl test kits alone could save so many thousands of lives, but Marco and the other Republicans rushing out to condemn this will do more or less anything to ensure that more people die, for the sake of the narrative. It's so reprehensible. They're murderers, by inclination.