“It does it for all opiates.”
“I can already feel the first comment. What the hell is he talking about? Well, Okay. During the 1860’s Cannabis/Marijuana was used in the U.S. to get addicted people off alcohol, tobacco and opium, and it was very successful in doing so. Many Civil War veterans were addicted to all three of these.
About that time, Morphine and the hypodermic syringe were invented, which gave doctors real control of pain and brought about the concept that a physician’s first obligation to his patients was to control pain. It was far nicer and safer than opium or alcohol.
The chemists went to work on opium and synthesized many different compounds, several of which were found to be more powerful, and more addicting than Morphine, the original opiate. These more powerful drugs were Oxycodone, Hydrocodone, Dilaudid, and Heroin, which is diacetyl morphine. Codeine, another opiate, was a much weaker opiate and its use has been minimal in the face of these much stronger opiates.
With heavy advertising and mouth-to-ear gossip, patients demanded the strong opiates. This brought on a real problem for physicians — give the patients the strong opiates, or they will find another doctor who will.
These strong opiates are notorious for not only causing addictions but they can easily cause death from accidental overdose or suicides, which are in the thousands. So, Doctors will give you enough to turn you into an addict. 20 pills. Then they say no. But the patient is still in pain, so the patient changes doctors, and repeats the action. Soon they realize it is easier to get drugs on the street.
The state medical boards have jumped into this mess by ordering physicians to stop writing these strong opiate prescriptions.
What is a patient to do about this?”
More: http://salem-news.com/articles/july272013/pain-marijuana_pl.php