Biometric opioid vending machine unveiled in Vancouver

[CrunkLord420]

Based and opiate-pilled.

 

[Ineedahero]

How is having hydromorphine gonna help someone who is having withdraws from something like heroin or fentanyl? That sounds like only giving one can of beer, once a day, to an alcoholic whose been drinking a fifth of vodka everyday for 20 years and thinking its harm reduction therapy.

Yeah, the point of stopping using a drug is to stop using it, not to get fucked up in the usual manner but with government support.

It was, by Christian missionaries.

Are they Christian? I thought they were a Christian related cult?

 

[ToroidalBoat]

wow this is so cyberpunk

 

[The Real SVP]

Are they Christian? I thought they were a Christian related cult?

No true Scotsman, and all that. Take away the whole (child)prostitution thing, and they look like perfectly fine evangelical Christians to me. Some people go to war for their gods, others go to bed.

 

[The Fool]

This is one of the most democratic PR stunts I have ever seen. An automated system to hand out free drugs with none of the icky human interaction which, at best, does nothing to help the people it's meant for, and, at worst, makes the problem bigger. It's like a tumblr post brought to life, I can just imagine all the insane twitter users praising this. Now all we need is public dilation stations.

 

[Cow Poly]

This won’t work because heroin addicts will just use right on top of the cheap/legal pills.
You could include a blocker like naloxone to the pills but this will encourage addicts to simply NOT use them.
Asking heroin addicts to take a pill doesn’t address the fact that using a needle is its own, separate, addiction.

 

[Carcinogenesis]

The whole point of harm reduction strategies is to ultimately get those hooked on drugs back to a state of stability. It's not just about supplying safer drugs, but also getting those crippled by addiction off the street. For example, these care facilities would need to have doctors to assist with safe injection, social workers to help with personal issues/employment and maybe even temporary housing. Throwing drugs at those suffering from drug addiction won't fix the issue, it'll just give the illusion that things are getting better. Additionally, adding technology to the mixes such as apps just creates privacy issues.

 

[The Demon]

if this machine gets broken into and makes the opioid crisis even worse, then the story should be unveiled on the front page for all to see. oh who am i kidding, WHEN this machine gets broken into

 

[HollaGemini]

It is going to be fucking hysterical if we see 10 homeless Canadians working together rocking that machine like mad to get at the heroin inside.
It'll be like watching a bear look for honey.

 

[mx. yuk]

The whole point of harm reduction strategies is to ultimately get those hooked on drugs back to a state of stability. It's not just about supplying safer drugs, but also getting those crippled by addiction off the street. For example, these care facilities would need to have doctors to assist with safe injection, social workers to help with personal issues/employment and maybe even temporary housing. Throwing drugs at those suffering from drug addiction won't fix the issue, it'll just give the illusion that things are getting better. Additionally, adding technology to the mixes such as apps just creates privacy issues.

Usually these types of programs are reserved for people who have shown little likelihood of ever fully recovering from addiction, the idea is to get them on a stable and safely administered dose of drugs so that all the attendant issues that tend to make people act like public nuisances/junkie pieces of shit (shooting up in the street, ODing 8 times in one day, buying and selling drugs in front of elementary schools or whatever else...) are rectified. This pilot program only has 8 people in it, my guess is that they're weathered old junkies who have been methadonians for years but still can't get their shit together and keep fucking up on fentanyl, much to the chagrin of the 3 people left in downtown Vancouver who aren't also on fentanyl. I could be wrong though.

Anyway I'm pro legalizing drugs and not against treating addiction like a public health issue but I posted this because the vending machine aspect is just a hilarious vision from a dystopian future and a typically overwrought response to what could be a very simple problem (just sell opioids in regular vending machines, like duh!)

Edit: also have only been to downtown Vancouver once in recent years but the people there are seriously fucked and look like the addicts you see in documentaries about krokodil in Russia, like some serious flesh-eating virus-having, stooped-over zombified junkies that make the bums in the SF tenderloin look positively bright eyed and bushy tailed by comparison, so I'm guessing the people working 'harm reduction' have decided it's important to get people hooked to stuff that's relatively pure and not tainted with Drano and ball sweat...

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

First thing, biometric opioid is a good band name.

Second, it's things like that that make me doubt the idea that future tech would be 100% automated. Since, at least in the current legal framework, you always need to employ a person that can wield and fire a shotgun.

To quote Alex Jones immortal words:
You can't ban the iron rod.

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

Would rather junkies toss needles around an easy to clean up area over needles being stashed in pants at Wal-Mart. Would you rather get aids from checking the depth of pants pockets or see junkies shoot up in a contained zone?

 

[Sperghetti]

Imagine the outcry if something else the politicians say causes thousands of deaths a year came in unregulated vending machine form?

Funny how I haven’t seen a cigarette vending machine in ages. I wonder why?

 

[keyboredsm4shthe2nd]

The whole point of harm reduction strategies is to ultimately get those hooked on drugs back to a state of stability. It's not just about supplying safer drugs, but also getting those crippled by addiction off the street. For example, these care facilities would need to have doctors to assist with safe injection, social workers to help with personal issues/employment and maybe even temporary housing. Throwing drugs at those suffering from drug addiction won't fix the issue, it'll just give the illusion that things are getting better. Additionally, adding technology to the mixes such as apps just creates privacy issues.

This is on the same level of stupid as the proposed "homeless complex". You can't get better putting a band-aid on a bullet hole. Except in this case, they're really just handing you bullets and asking you to pretend they're band aids.

 

[murgatroid]

This is on the same level of stupid as the proposed "homeless complex". You can't get better putting a band-aid on a bullet hole. Except in this case, they're really just handing you bullets and asking you to pretend they're band aids.

ACKshually in many Scandinavian countries they have heroin maintenance programs for addicts as a last resort who don't respond to other treatments. They come in twice a day and get a set dose of pharmaceutical grade diamorphine (heroin) and they administer it under the supervision of a nurse. Many of the addicts in these programs respond really well and have been able to get jobs and re-connect with family. Most of the harm from heroin comes from all the things associated with heroin use and not heroin itself.

Here's a Swiss example:

 

[TalkinZed]

ACKshually in many Scandinavian countries they have heroin maintenance programs for addicts as a last resort who don't respond to other treatments. They come in twice a day and get a set dose of pharmaceutical grade diamorphine (heroin) and they administer it under the supervision of a nurse. Many of the addicts in these programs respond really well and have been able to get jobs and re-connect with family. Most of the harm from heroin comes from all the things associated with heroin use and not heroin itself.

Here's a Swiss example:

Agreed. You can be a high-functioning heroin addict, although it's incredibly expensive.

When you're addicted to opiates, being high feels normal - you're still somewhat impaired, but it's probably analogous to a 0.05 BAC; not being high, though, and you want to die

 

[Dante Alighieri]

Just give them a delayed release fatal dose of fentanyl so they get euthanized.

They get what they deserve and society is cleaned up.

 

[Feline Supremacist]

Agreed. You can be a high-functioning heroin addict, although it's incredibly expensive.

When you're addicted to opiates, being high feels normal - you're still somewhat impaired, but it's probably analogous to a 0.05 BAC; not being high, though, and you want to die

I met a doctor who explained the things that kill addicts isn't the heroin but things like infections/diseases from dirty needles and street living. As long as an addict has access to good quality heroin and the money to pay for it they could lead functioning healthy lives. Being around other addicts was the biggest barrier to stopping heroin use in his experience. He said he met people who had gone to prison, stopped using heroin for years yet as soon as they crossed the GW the need to get high was so overwhelming they relasped by the end of the day.

He does studies on addiction and one that he did involved having addicts come in for extended stays where they were given pharmaceutical grade heroin and did interviews/tasks while high. Afterward they'd be offered free treatment to get them off the drug, housing and employment. He had a huge problem getting addicts to come in for a one month stay (they couldn't leave) despite all the free heroin/things because a huge part of addiction is getting high with other addicts. That's very revealing about the nature of addiction-the physical addiction is easier to treat than the addict mentality.

 

[WonderWino]

So the city screeching the most about how there is an opioid crisis, that they are entirely responsible for causing, thinks the solution is to install a fucking vending machine to hand out opioids to people

and they put it in fucking hastings of all places? literally the biggest opioid market in the country, in the place hit the worst by said opioid crisis. Because of course they fucking did

FFS vancouver hasn't changed a fucking bit since I left. If anything its run by even bigger idiots

 

[He Who Points And Laughs]

A dear friend of mine had a sort of modest proposal which adhered to the principals of liberty while also defending the people from the scourge of degenerate junkies. Zoning laws.

Pick an area, fence it in, and build a warehouse connected to a crematorium. Have unlimited drugs in the warehouse with the only stipulation being "use as much as you want, but you have to use it here." As the junkies OD, chuck them into the furnace.