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This will probably get some play and is a bit of a different topic. Former CEO of YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicicki son died of a drug freshman year of college at Cal.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/former-youtube-ceos-son-found-dead-uc-berkeley-rcna139355
The obvious implications is he took something laced with fentanyl. Culture war wise concerns about fentanyl are red coded though issues with fentanyl seem apparent in both red and blue states and people.
Overall I feel like this issue has lost its place in the news cycle. A quick google overdose deaths topped 112k in 2023 an all-time record. I am seeing a current U.S. population of 334 million. So to put this in perspective 112k multiplied by an average lifespan of 80 years is like 9 million deaths. Or close to 3% of US population at current rates will die by a drug overdose. I think I can fairly say it’s a huge issue even if you disagree with how I’m calculating the average persons risks of OD at around 3% in their lifetime.
Quick analysis of the kid he looks in shape for a 19 year old and was majoring in math so he’s the dream of any parent. Odd thing is he was found unresponsive at 4:23 pm on a Tuesday. That is going to be weird and details will come out as that time frame is more of an addict death. Versus I expected a weekend OD and he did some fentanyl laced coke/Molly during the weekend.
From people I’ve talked to opioids are amazing. I do not know if I’ve ever done them. They have to be if people do them. I’ve done molly/coke/mushrooms in the past. The big thing to me is I’m paranoid I’m doing something laced now and have largely cut out doing anything now.
The midtwit take is that dealers either sell both and cross contaminate or lace other drugs to get people addicted. Personally opinion and perhaps a difference without a difference is it’s probably lacing just so people say it’s the good shit.
Sorry for their loss.
Culture war issues
Plays into the immigration debate of not controlling the border
Blue states seem to be adopting a let it happen and treat but it doesn’t seem to be working
War on drug topics. I don’t think the old war on drugs ever dealt with the death rate we have now but war on drugs doesn’t seem stupid when it’s a 3% population level lifetime death rate which is far higher than COVID and killing people with high life expectancy
Other policy considerations. Some would say things like legalize drugs to kill fentanyl and people get “safe” drugs. Some conservative arguments that something’s should just be illegal. Opioids probably are fantastic but the death rate for someone who tries opioids seems extremely high.
My numeracy tells me this is a big problem and I believe an order of magnitude bigger problem than COVID. I don’t think it’s quite as hard coded in culture wars.
There are safety precautions when taking something that didn't come from a pharmacy:
The dealer's incentive is to get people addicted to something that will get the user coming back frequently to buy more. Fentanyl is cheaper by weight than many other drugs and doesn't last very long before it puts the user into withdrawals and causes them to seek out more.
If a first-time user comes in for drug X and then get addicted to fentanyl the dealer then has a daily recurring revenue stream.
In this case a potential pipeline is that the deceased user started with a party drug in the past, but it was laced with fentanyl and he then became addicted. Like you say it is hard to imagine what other drug he would have been intending to use on a weekday afternoon that would have been laced.
The DEA scheduling system is absurd. They should make some of the safer ones legal (especially psychedelics) so that:
I definitely knew people who did coke on weekday afternoons in college, presumably cost wasn’t an issue for him.
Also, I thought fentanyl test strips are often ineffective for eg laced coke because it could be just a tiny fraction of the powder that’s fentanyl, so the strip could come back fine even if the drug isn’t?
But coke is usually a social drug and he was found alone. If he wanted a stimulant to use alone I assume he had access to prescription Adderall or Ritalin. I don't have personal experience on this subject so this is just speculative guesswork.
That is true that there is a detection limit on test strips. You could just test a larger sample, but then you'd have to turn the coke/water mixture back to coke or take it sublingually.
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