Comments on: Paving the roads with dead drug addicts http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/2009/09/05/paving-the-roads-with-dead-drug-addicts/ This is what I care about. Why do you care? Sun, 12 Jun 2011 18:31:01 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Jakob Breivik Grimstveit http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/2009/09/05/paving-the-roads-with-dead-drug-addicts/comment-page-1/#comment-115 Jakob Breivik Grimstveit Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:39:55 +0000 http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/?p=113#comment-115 I'm not necessary talking about "fixing" the addicts, that topic is probably suitable for a blog post or two in itself. For many of the addicts it's not about getting clean at all - they often either lack the motivation, or are just too deep into the bad habit. It's more about helping the addicts to not hurt themselves, providing simple damage prevention and damage control. Injection guidance, hygiene advice and providing sterile equipment in a safe environment would probably reduce the number of OD's in general (and consequently terminal OD's as well) by as much as 95%. Why isn't this done? It isn't done because it's considered unethical. Evidently it's better to let them kill themselves. Slowly. The politicians should, in my humble opinion, look at this from a somewhat more pragmatic viewpoint. This, however, still seems to be far away (at least if the conservatives get their way). I probably could have worded myself better on the "question" of how much a life is worth, but the main point still stands (I hope). We spend enormous amounts on traffic safety, in order to save lives, which I by no means disagree with. But I think the society would benefit greatly if one spent more time and money on helping the drug abusers as well. These two issues are not mutually exclusive - we can do both! Both when it comes to traffic safety and drug abuse, the cost of improving the current situation might actually lead to saving ourselves money. The issue of traffic safety has been addressed for many years already, but next to nothing have been done to help the unfortunate drug addicts. We don't need to set up a number-crunching beowulf-cluster of Excel-spreadsheets to see that the drug addicts in Norway more or less are being ignored, hidden away from public. I mean, even the police just want them to go away, to some fictional place where noone can neither see or hear them(!). What you point out in the end is definetly a very valid point, and we can only hope to gain more knowledge of what makes some people addicts and others not, but I'm just not certain whether one actually can come to a good conclusion on that. These are my personal views, and I do not claim to know the true answer to this. But I do think I see a better way of handling this than todays situation. Erling Gjelsvik, a writer for BA.no <a href="http://www.ba.no/meninger/article4562617.ece" rel="nofollow">disagrees rather strongly with me</a>, and seems have lost all sense of empathy (<a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http://www.ba.no/meninger/article4562617.ece&sl=no&tl=en" rel="nofollow">auto-translated into English by Google</a>). It would be interesting to meet him someday to understand the basis of such a senseless rant. I’m not necessary talking about “fixing” the addicts, that topic is probably suitable for a blog post or two in itself. For many of the addicts it’s not about getting clean at all – they often either lack the motivation, or are just too deep into the bad habit. It’s more about helping the addicts to not hurt themselves, providing simple damage prevention and damage control.

Injection guidance, hygiene advice and providing sterile equipment in a safe environment would probably reduce the number of OD’s in general (and consequently terminal OD’s as well) by as much as 95%.

Why isn’t this done? It isn’t done because it’s considered unethical. Evidently it’s better to let them kill themselves. Slowly.

The politicians should, in my humble opinion, look at this from a somewhat more pragmatic viewpoint. This, however, still seems to be far away (at least if the conservatives get their way).

I probably could have worded myself better on the “question” of how much a life is worth, but the main point still stands (I hope). We spend enormous amounts on traffic safety, in order to save lives, which I by no means disagree with. But I think the society would benefit greatly if one spent more time and money on helping the drug abusers as well. These two issues are not mutually exclusive – we can do both!

Both when it comes to traffic safety and drug abuse, the cost of improving the current situation might actually lead to saving ourselves money. The issue of traffic safety has been addressed for many years already, but next to nothing have been done to help the unfortunate drug addicts. We don’t need to set up a number-crunching beowulf-cluster of Excel-spreadsheets to see that the drug addicts in Norway more or less are being ignored, hidden away from public. I mean, even the police just want them to go away, to some fictional place where noone can neither see or hear them(!).

What you point out in the end is definetly a very valid point, and we can only hope to gain more knowledge of what makes some people addicts and others not, but I’m just not certain whether one actually can come to a good conclusion on that.

These are my personal views, and I do not claim to know the true answer to this. But I do think I see a better way of handling this than todays situation.

Erling Gjelsvik, a writer for BA.no disagrees rather strongly with me, and seems have lost all sense of empathy (auto-translated into English by Google). It would be interesting to meet him someday to understand the basis of such a senseless rant.

]]> By: Carl-Erik http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/2009/09/05/paving-the-roads-with-dead-drug-addicts/comment-page-1/#comment-86 Carl-Erik Sun, 06 Sep 2009 17:42:38 +0000 http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/?p=113#comment-86 Flott innlegg, men jeg må innrømme jeg kom hit av en annen grunn: søkte etter "norbits" på Delicous og fant din personlige innloggingsurl. Om du er interessert i personvern skjønner du sikkert at det ikke er en spesielt heldig kombinasjon: jeg fant deg (og ditt ekte navn) etter to tastetrykk. Husk å uke av for "Private" når du skal lagre bokmerker som er av sensitiv natur. Bare et tips :) Flott innlegg, men jeg må innrømme jeg kom hit av en annen grunn: søkte etter “norbits” på Delicous og fant din personlige innloggingsurl. Om du er interessert i personvern skjønner du sikkert at det ikke er en spesielt heldig kombinasjon: jeg fant deg (og ditt ekte navn) etter to tastetrykk. Husk å uke av for “Private” når du skal lagre bokmerker som er av sensitiv natur.

Bare et tips :)

]]> By: Kirk http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/2009/09/05/paving-the-roads-with-dead-drug-addicts/comment-page-1/#comment-82 Kirk Sat, 05 Sep 2009 00:48:24 +0000 http://grimstveit.no/jakob/blog/?p=113#comment-82 I think one difference is that you can almost fix a road, but seldom fix an addict. You're getting into the very very tricky mathematics of the value of a human life (a scary and fascinating field) and the way politicians and bureaucrats interpret it. I suppose the best avenue is research to understand the point at which recreational drug use turns into a life threatening habit. I have seen tons of the former and a bit of the latter. It's not immediately apparent to me what differentiates the people who go on to live happy productive lives and the ones who ruin everything. I think one difference is that you can almost fix a road, but seldom fix an addict. You’re getting into the very very tricky mathematics of the value of a human life (a scary and fascinating field) and the way politicians and bureaucrats interpret it.

I suppose the best avenue is research to understand the point at which recreational drug use turns into a life threatening habit. I have seen tons of the former and a bit of the latter. It’s not immediately apparent to me what differentiates the people who go on to live happy productive lives and the ones who ruin everything.

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