One in Ten Thousand Ain't Bad... or is it?

Did you catch the front-page story in The St. Petersburg Times on Sunday, February 17?

Prescription drug painkillers are ruining the lives of individuals, families and longtime friendships. Dying from an overdose is a sure way to put a quick end to each and every relationship, good or bad.

The Times provided a descriptive list that accompanied pictures and bar graphs identifying the increase of each drug in 2005 and 2006. Four of the drugs showed double-digit percentile increases, as much as 75%; two drugs were at a status quo level; the others represented a group of drugs that have seen a decrease over a year’s time. Most are painkillers while others are muscle relaxers that double as cough suppressants.

Regardless of their names or active ingredients, these drugs can all have the same effect if not taken as prescribed: death. Pop a pill, crush another one and maybe mix them with alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, crack, or some other street drug and you don’t know what you got until maybe it’s too late.

I took note that figures shown for Hernando County were low, 11 in 2005 and 18 in 2006. But, that represents an increase of 64%, which is more than double any of the other three counties - Pinellas, Pasco and Hillsborough. Heck, you might brush the number aside if you equated the figures in Hernando County to show that “just” .012% of the population (160,000) overdosed in 2006. That’s “only” slightly more than 1 in 10,000! Numbers also indicate the odds will get better for early deaths by prescription drug overdose.

I heard myself sigh a barely audible humph when I read one of the results of a study of accidental deaths by overdose: The dead most often held jobs in manual labor, the service industry or the medical field. Holy cow, momma, that’s just we got here in Hernando County – lotsa them there jobs.

The numbers don’t surprise me. I’m surprised the figures aren’t higher. I have very little doubt that the number of habitual users and abusers would make your head spin without the assistance of any of these drugs. I also suspect there are a pretty good percentage of teenagers and young adults in their 20's who partake on a regular basis, putting themselves at risk. It’s trendy stuff and boy is it fun to get other kids to join the pack. Male and female, alike, do it and it’s really neat when two like-minded people can get it on and get off together.

There are drug dealers, but there are also "bud’s" and "bro’s" to count on to supplement a daily regiment of ‘scripts. If you don’t meet ‘em at school, you have one heck of a good chance to hook up with a few good contacts when you spend a couple nights in the county jail. That’s the cool thing about being behind bars: there’s always something "good" to look forward to when probation begins.

Yep, Hernando County is where construction jobs (manual labor), retail jobs (the service industry) and doctor assistants (medical field) are in full bloom, just like the poppy fields in Afghanistan during harvest season.

And you know what? The number of deaths by drug overdose will increase exponentially with more of the same job opportunities in the foreseeable future. The local job market needs a pain reliever.

Dear Father, who art in heaven, please deliver us from these evils!