Drug Peddling Senior Citizens Syndicate
Geriatrics behind bars – and in front of them
Appalachian Sting
I’ve written before about the illicit prescription drug trade in this country. It’s a little-known blight on mainstream medicine – and it gets nowhere near enough play in the mainstream media, which nets a lot of money from drug ads. In past Daily Doses, I’ve warned about middle- and high-school kids hawking their anti-depressants to other children who are looking for a high. I’ve also sounded the alarm about college-aged students hording and selling their ill-begotten ADHD stimulants Ritalin and Aderall to their fellow pupils for “all-nighter” study sessions (Daily Dose, 10/24/2005).
But I never thought prescription pushing would sink this low: A recent Associated Press article reveals that authorities in Kentucky have busted a drug peddling syndicate that rivals a New York narcotics ring – among senior citizens in dirt-poor Appalachia!
As it turns out, a large number of elderly patients in that region have been selling their prescription painkillers and other medications to young pill addicts, in some cases for years. According to the piece, a Bluegrass State anti-drug task force has charged more than 40 senior citizens with criminal re-selling of prescription drugs – including the sometimes deadly OxyContin (the same painkiller that some tabloids linked with larger-than-life talk show host Rush Limbaugh several years ago).
Apparently, the drug-related arrests of these seasoned felons have been so frequent that the already-taxed local jails have struggled to adapt to the increased cost of servicing the needs of elderly inmates. And according to sources cited in the article, the practice is almost certainly not limited to the Appalachian region.
Other sources in the piece all but absolve these geriatric felons of their closet sales enterprise – insisting that for many, the supplemental income garnered by selling off their pills for as much as $10 a pop is necessary for those on fixed incomes to help make ends meet. The irony of this is so thick: If you buy into this twisted logic, these seniors are being forced to deal drugs in order to pay for the high cost of living
Especially their ever-more expensive PRESCRIPTION DRUGS!
Here’s an idea for these folks: Do a little digging to find the natural cures that can treat you just as well for pennies on the dollar (oh yes, they exist). After all, if you take fewer drugs, you won’t need to shell out so much for them.
But this is moot advice. I think the problem’s nowhere near as spurred-by-necessity or nobly tragic as what some of the article’s sources point to as causational factors. I simply believe that the criminal urge knows no age threshold – and that there are bad apples among all demographics, young and old alike. But what makes it doubly bad is that these aging criminals are enabling the rise of a whole new generation of addicts, who will no doubt turn into pushers themselves once they hit Social Security age.
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Lifting spirits lifts spirits in one old-folks home
Nobody likes a nursing home. They’re just not fun places, for the most part.
But at least one of them on the Emerald Isle (where else) is most certainly a lot cheerier than most others. It’s the one where residents are “nursing” pints and shots from the full-service pub in the back!
That’s right, according to a recent Reuters article, the St. Mary’s Hospital facility for the aged in Ireland’s County Monaghan has enjoyed great success at keeping its patients peppy – by giving them regular access to not only pints of beer, but the daily social atmosphere at an on-site pub.
The home’s Directors and staff insist it’s good for the patients, and may even make them live longer. I’d definitely buy that – the antioxidants and health benefits in good stout, whiskey, and wine have proven their worth in my eyes (and even in the eyes of many in the mainstream) many times over.
But even if it didn’t add one minute more to life spans of the lucky denizens of this one happy nursing home, it would still be worth it. The enhanced quality of life a good pint with good friends gives is more than benefit enough, if you ask me.
Always lifting spirits – and never pushing pills,
William Campbell Douglass II, MD
