We can’t bomb our way to fewer overdoses

The fentanyl-fueled overdose dilemma is both heartbreaking and terrifying It has devastated communities rural and urban across all races and socioeconomic backgrounds We know this pain both professionally and personally One of us served as an American defense official and Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Counternarcotics and Stabilization Guidelines working to combat drug trafficking The other leads the Drug Framework Alliance having lost a family member to overdose and fighting daily for solutions that save lives Though our experiences differ we are united in one goal preventing addiction and keeping people safe In annual overdose deaths fell nearly the largest single-year decrease ever recorded These aren t just numbers They represent people revived from opioid overdoses with naloxone people who avoided a fatal dose because they used a fentanyl test strip and people who stabilized their lives because they at last received methadone or buprenorphine to curb withdrawal clues and cravings We are saving lives because we completely started investing in what works a health-based approach to drugs Related Trump s boundary war won t stop overdoses In fact it might make things worse That is why it is inconceivable that instead of expanding these soundness solutions the regime is gutting them At the moment we should be doubling down to end the overdose problem which still kills more Americans than guns federal leadership is slashing nearly billion from Medicaid the largest source of addiction rehabilitation in the country Hundreds of millions more have been cut from overdose prevention programs leaving states with fewer fentanyl test strips less naloxone and fewer pathways to effective cure options Drug research funding has also been gutted even though the potent illicit drug supply is changing faster than ever and demands research into evidence-based treatments not political theater In Maine an million federal funding cut left masses soundness programs including vaccination clinics district healthcare services and overdose prevention outreach on the brink of collapse Programs scrambled to keep essential services open with countless scaling back or cutting their services The upshot People struggling with addiction in rural communities children with disabilities veterans and seniors had their lifelines taken away It is inconceivable that instead of expanding these strength solutions the administration is gutting them The federal executive cannot effectively address the harms of fentanyl while stripping away the wellness strategies that prevent fentanyl overdoses And we cannot allow Congress to look away from the human cost of these choices As one parent whose child has struggled with addiction shared President Trump you re out there declaring war on fentanyl and then you re taking away from the people you re supposed to protect The contradiction becomes even more sharp when you look beyond our borders to the escalating military violence overseas and a latest presidential pardon As lifesaving services are cut the administration is using drugs as a pretext for unauthorized military strikes in the Caribbean and Pacific Executives have killed at least people on boats they claim posed an immediate and direct threat to our nation yet have provided no evidence to justify this violence Both Democrats and Republicans have raised concerns including Sen Rand Paul of Kentucky Sen Roger Wicker of Mississippi Reps Mike Rogers of Alabama and Mike Turner of Ohio The U S is bombing boats that have nothing to do with fentanyl or the overdose situation devastating American communities These latest military actions have negligible impact on the transshipment of illicit drugs and absolutely no impact on the production or movement of synthetic opioids And fentanyl the synthetic opioid responsible for majority U S overdoses is not produced in Venezuela Start your day with essential news from Salon Sign up for our free morning newsletter Crash Module Just of late former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hern ndez sentenced last year to years in prison for his role in a major drug-trafficking operation was issued following a pardon from President Donald Trump These developments raise serious questions about the direction of U S drug program We must ask ourselves if these extrajudicial strikes are not stopping fentanyl then what are the motives History should be a warning to us In the Philippines under Rodrigo Duterte the drug war became a tool of fear Thousands were killed without trial democratic institutions were hollowed out and civil liberties stripped away all while drugs continued to flow into the country We need your help to stay independent Subscribe in the present day to sponsorship Salon s progressive journalism Americans understand this Seventy percent oppose military actions against Venezuela And seventy five percent believe addiction is a robustness issue not a criminal one We all want strategies rooted in dignity and safety that get results not endless wars abroad and gutted fitness care at home As the establishment prioritizes punishment over rehabilitation violence over strength we need population care and mutual aid more than ever And that is what the drug strategy movement has constantly been built on For years everyday people stepped up when institutions did not saving lives with naloxone preventing overdoses with fentanyl test strips guiding loved ones into care and offering the trauma-informed mental fitness patronage that has inevitably been under-resourced These interventions have constantly saved lives siblings cousins neighbors friends If we want to protect our loved ones and improve general medical we must reject harmful austerity and this dubious expansion of violence in favor of what works That means fully-funded Medicaid to expand healing access including medications for opioid use disorder It means restoring funding to the overdose prevention and physical condition services that have been saving lives across the country And it means a drug initiative agenda at home and abroad that embraces care and rejects war Read more about drug agenda Donald Trump doesn t understand the drug war he s fighting Only the people can save the people As Trump guts harm reduction programs activists fight back The gospel according to Amanita muscaria the world s the greater part charismatic mushroom The post We can t bomb our way to fewer overdoses appeared first on Salon com