A cautionary tale: One of my neighbors has been having addiction issues

[LuvNewcastle]

3. Yes, a lot of people self-medicate either

because they don't seek care or because they aren't able to get adequate care. And some people, like schizophrenics, have urges for certain drugs that science can't really explain.

A lot of time has been wasted over the years, telling people to just say no and giving them no information about what to do when they or others say yes. Drugs are a fact of life in our society, and I see some of them becoming more prevalent. We should arm our kids and others with the information they need about how to deal with common drugs and common ailments. I think it would save a lot of lives and would certainly be better than telling scary stories.

I'm hoping that the experiments that scientists are doing now with cannabis find a lot of ways the drug can help people in pain. Cannabis already helps a lot of people with pain, such as myself, but I'm sure there are many more ways that they can find to give people relief with it. I've been on opiates before, and they only work for rather short periods and, as the OP notes, opiates are very addictive and can cause accidents involving others.

I'm hoping that more insured people will equal more people finding proper treatment for their pain and psychological problems, but it's going to take a long time before we're going to see most people getting the proper treatment. All we can do in the meantime is educate ourselves and offer our help where it's needed.