Opioids Are Safer Than Alcohol

That's right.  As the late comic-prophet Bill Hicks would say:  "You can stop your internal dialogue now."  

Here's why:  Opioids up to and including fentanyl do not cause organ damage even when taken daily for the duration of a person's life.  They have legit, proven medical uses unlike alcohol which is a toxin in any dose or form.  Ethanol is a Group I carcinogen according to the IARC.  This means it's in the same class as asbestos, benzene, formaldehyde, Hepatitis B & HPV in terms of cancer risk.  It causes cancer of the esophagus, stomach, liver, colon, rectum & breast among others.  In 2020, an estimated 741,300 new cases of cancer worldwide were caused solely by alcohol consumption.  It also causes chronic liver damage in the form of cirrhosis when consumed long-term; if continued beyond this point, liver failure will ensue.  There's no equivalent type of chronic organ damage with opioids.*

Both opioids and alcohol have addictive potential, but the true potential for addiction lies within the individual.  For instance, if a person dislikes the effects of alcohol & prefers the way opioids make them feel, they're more likely to become addicted to opioids.  And vice versa.  It all comes down to genetics, metabolism, brain chemistry & other unique traits.  Both substances are capable of causing overdose--opioids by respiratory depression and alcohol via ethanol poisoning.  

Where alcohol is worse is in the withdrawal department.  While opioid withdrawal is indisputably miserable, it's not fatal as long as the person avoids dehydration.  Alcohol withdrawal can kill by causing seizures, convulsions, psychosis, coma & other severe complications resulting in death.  There's also the kindling effect in which every successive withdrawal is more severe with alcohol.  Alcoholism can also cause TWO types of dementia--Wernicke encephalopathy & Korsakoff Syndrome which often occur together.  The horrifying video below illustrates just how life-destroying these conditions are & how much they resemble other types of dementia.  

A Case of Confusion (Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome)

There's no other drug as detrimental to a developing fetus as alcohol, which has its own "syndrome".  The CDC and every other health agency agree there's NO safe amount of alcohol during any point of pregnancy, though women often take issue with this due to myths about wine being healthy (or their own selfish unwillingness to quit drinking for 9 months).  Fetal Alcohol Syndrome is a spectrum disorder that wreaks havoc on sufferers, causing lifelong developmental, mental, emotional & physical problems.  Oh, and drinking while pregnant also puts the fetus at risk for stillbirth, premature delivery, low birthweight & spontaneous abortion.  Opioids can be prescribed for short periods during pregnancy & are routinely used in delivery rooms in the form of epidurals that contain fentanyl, sufentanil or other powerful drugs.

The two main risks of opioids are overdose and addiction.  Side effects include constipation, itching & reduced sex drive for some users.  Babies can be born addicted which is a tragedy, but they won't be born deformed.  Organ damage, sepsis & other secondary complications are a result of injecting with dirty needles which is totally avoidable if our government would legalize/regulate the drug supply & educate the drug-using public on safer drug use practices.  Overdose is mainly a result of two phenomena:  adulteration of the drug supply and drug combinations like opioids + depressants that cause respiratory depression when taken together.  That's a statistical fact.  

Again, these are entirely preventable with basic harm reduction measures and aren't the fault of opioids themselves in a majority of cases.  While it's possible to overdose on a high dose of opioids alone, addicts who know their tolerance level & are sure of the purity of their drug are unlikely to OD when they have access to the information to prevent overdose.  

Putting It All Together

Now read this article again and substitute amphetamines, ketamine, LSD, mescaline, khat, methylone, MDMA or nearly any drug in Schedule I, II or III for "alcohol" (or "tobacco" for that matter) and this article reads the same way.  

So where are all the media scare stories about these deadly legal drugs and all the cancer, dementia, addiction, seizures & cirrhosis deaths they're causing everyday all over the world?  Comedian Bill Hicks, whom I mentioned in the first sentence of this piece, died of pancreatic cancer at the shockingly young age of 32 likely due to his excessive smoking habit (which was probably helped along by a history of heavy drinking).  Pancreatic cancer at this age is rare so it's widely accepted that his lifestyle contributed to his development of the disease.

There's no question the opioid crisis is real & devastating.  But if you're going to report on opioid deaths, at least do it accurately.  People are dying from an adulterated drug supply, abstinence-only drug education & the resulting ignorance, not opioids themselves.  If a heroin user buys a bag of dope expecting heroin and gets fentanyl, that's a drug prohibition death and it was preventable.  Fentanyl itself is not evil--it too has medical uses.  It's illicit fentanyl taken unwittingly that's the problem, and that's a result of the drug war.  The End.  The reason we don't see outbreaks of death & blindness from poisoned moonshine today is because alcohol in all its many forms is legal, regulated for purity & sold only to adults with ID.  That wasn't the case during alcohol prohibition.  

In conclusion, our drug scheduling system is totally political and not science-based.  It's ass-backwards & helps no one except those who profit financially from keeping SOME drugs illegal.  Hopefully you can figure out who that is.  Bottom line:  it ain't us.    

* While tobacco & alcohol cause chronic organ damage with long-term use, opioids don't damage any particular organ even with lifelong use as long as the person avoids overdose & unsanitary practices like intravenous injection with dirty needles.  

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