Yeah, and several people I went to high school with have already died from overdoses. I don't think that's an explanation, I think it's a problem.

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Same with my class. It is both an explanation (as to why statistics in life expectancy have shifted downwards) and a problem. It doesn't have to be one or the other in this case.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

I think 5 or 6 from my class of 40 people have died from drugs. I'm 34.

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I don't have any reports of folks from my 700-ish graduating class dying. But I did see an article one time on a guy who was managing a Jiffy Lube. Apparently he was bullying the teenage employees and got arrested. The guy always had anger management issues (like total red face when playing sports in gym class), so there's that.

But then, I don't go to reunions.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

The overdoses do not surprise me. The liver failure does. That was generally and old man disease and one for serious drinkers. I know a couple people that had hereditary liver problems but under 40 seems really odd.

The story was behind a paywall but I can only imagine interactions that were not there previously. The biggest overlooked liver killer is Tylenol (acetaminophen). I do think there is not enough information out there that young big drinkers not use Tylenol. Also, if some of the opioid abusers are also big drinkers they do not know many of their painkiller pills have a huge amount of acetaminophen mixed in (hydrocodone).

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Elections have consequences.

The overdoses do not surprise me. The liver failure does. That was generally and old man disease and one for serious drinkers. I know a couple people that had hereditary liver problems but under 40 seems really odd.

The story was behind a paywall but I can only imagine interactions that were not there previously. The biggest overlooked liver killer is Tylenol (acetaminophen). I do think there is not enough information out there that young big drinkers not use Tylenol. Also, if some of the opioid abusers are also big drinkers they do not know many of their painkiller pills have a huge amount of acetaminophen mixed in (hydrocodone).

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Elections have consequences.

That is a great point. Tylenol is worse for your liver than booze.

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The liver failures being seen are related to alcohol. The reason cited for the increase is the shift from beer to hard liquor and the increase in binge drinking

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Spend some time drinking in other countries (Canada, UK, Netherlands, etc) ....Americans are minor-leaguers in comparison. Australia--a nation of hard-drinkers with shit that will kill you roaming every other inch of the landscape--somehow beats us in these categories.

OD's no doubt contribute to this stat: "and children who survive infancy have a 57 percent greater risk of death before reaching adulthood." Although this number's from a 2010 study...on the precipice of the opioid OD epidemic. it'd probably be worse in 2018.

But this one's an egregious failure of our health care system, given the typically on-going relationship between newborn and physician for the first part of a child's life: "In fact, a child born in the U.S. is 76 percent more likely to die before their first birthday than infants born in other wealthy countries."

None of these numbers are strictly recent phenomenon. We've trailed in these areas for decades; and appear to be falling further down the ranks as our percentage of GDP spent on health-care increases.

Paging Dr. Ken. Paging Dr. Ken.

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

that's f'd up. tho at least OD'ing only takes out the individual who OD's. wonder if there's a replacement effect w/r/t teenage drinking in terms of # surviving to "adulthood":

instead of a drunk 17 year old getting behind the wheel and taking out a carload of classmates-- he stays home and OD's in his bedroom, typically after a stint in rehab.

Had a few of those car accidents around here over the years. Seem to come in bunches.

The OD mirrors my nephew. I think he’s been out for 6 months from his third facility and was telling people the day he died the he was going back the next day. Just wanted one more. It’s no fun watching parents bury their kid.

Also, seeing that leash was still in High school when I moved here makes me feel old.

a parade of fresh-faced senior pictures on the local news post-accident seemed to be an awful rite of spring in the past.

first post-rehab days = dangerous due to tolerance at its nadir. tho i could def see even an experienced user overdoing the night before rehab; making a bigger buy than usual and then attempting to use up all their stash before going in.

He was a dumb kid. Really no other way to put it. Still a damn shame.

I was definitely dumb with drugs in my younger years, especially opioid pain killers. I'm lucky. That said, I didn't realize how bad the problem had gotten over the past 5 or 10 years. Not only my class... the kids who were younger than me have even MORE OD'S. I don't know any of the younger kids who are dying nowadays, but it seems like there's another death every few months.

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I just read the WSJ editorial from Charles Blahous on this plan. Apparently, he assumes that Medicare will have half the administrative costs of private plans and assumes that Medicare will be able to reimburse providers like it does now, which is 40% on average below private plans. As such, his $32.6T cost estimate is considered a lower bound on the total cost. He notes that the reason this plan is cheaper than today's current health spending is mainly because Medicare would reimburse at a 40% lower cost to providers.

He concludes that his cost projection is not realistic as it is too low. He expects that the current Sanders proposal would result in a significant jump in usage because it provides no cost to users of dental, vision, and hearing. Demand for such services would jump significantly among the current uninsured.

summary
https://www.mercatus.org/system/files/blahous-costs-medicare-mercatus-summary-v1_1.pdf

full
https://www.mercatus.org/system/files/blahous-costs-medicare-mercatus-working-paper-v1_1.pdf

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Hawaii (fuck) You

You don’t say?

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Elections have consequences.

Never would have guessed.

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You mean to tell me that a socialist like Sanders cannot even grasp the real world costs of his proposals?

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Is his failure to grasp that akin to your failure to grasp the inapplicability of the 80/20 rule?

Sounds to me like the dope game is going strong.

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You never miss your wealth, till your well went dry
Seem like only yesterday, you were here smiling
Now you gone away, but I know you in a better place
No traces of you, what can I do?
Alone and confused

Maybe Shirtless Driver can further elaborate about the mean streets of Galesburg since he is the board expert on what constitutes something being hood and what doesn't.

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Galesburg is only hood when you go South of Hy-Vee but North of Al's Sporting Goods.

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Sorry for reviving this thread.
I think this will be relevant: https://mynews4.com/features/well-being ... s-for-2025
It's about the changes in the prescription drug programs.

Let's not forget about the healthcare frauds. Some of them are described by this law firm.