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Teenagers are already taking drugs for depression and anxiety, as well as painkillers. Poles buy the latter two billion a year. We have been abusing alcohol, now we are changing it to pills. – We are like a passenger who has changed to another car, but is traveling on the same train – says Robert Banasiewicz, addiction treatment specialist. The effects are dramatic. Just like the data of the Chief Pharmaceutical Inspector and the National Medicines Institute on how many drugs are bought by Poles.
- During the year, Poles spend over PLN 30 billion in pharmacies. They buy one and a half billion painkillers (apart from pharmacies, another 500 million) and 19 million packages of antidepressants. According to the data of the Chief Pharmaceutical Inspector and the National Medicines Institute, a record was broken in this matter
- We were afraid of addiction to antidepressants. With these new generations, this is no longer a threat to us, so doctors began to prescribe them even to children. Effect? There is a growing generation that does not learn how to deal with emotions as well as with contacts and with other people
- There are still new substances that are becoming fashionable to take. This is the case now with fentanyl, which was known mainly to anesthesiologists – they anesthetized patients with it before the procedures. Today we apply it ourselves to numb the pain of… the soul
Zuzanna Opolska, Medonet: In terms of the number of painkillers taken, we rank second in Europe. Are we a nation of drug addicts?
Robert Banasiewicz, addiction treatment specialist, educator: Drug addiction is a global problem. In the United States, legal substances successfully compete with illegal drugs, the price of which is constantly falling. Doctors prescribe opioids, including fentanyl. I would not like to create conspiracy theories. I don’t think so. It is enough to watch the advertising blocks on TV to see which part is related to the advertising of drugs. There are at least eight pharmacies in my town. And yet popular painkillers can be bought in almost every grocery store and gas station, including those with codeine and ephedrine.
After painkillers, benzodiazepines come second on the Polish list …
This is definitely our market. Another problem is antidepressants.
Apparently “not addictive”?
Supposedly. However, many of them have very unpleasant withdrawal symptoms. The question is not whether a particular drug creates an “addiction syndrome” or not. The problem is that younger and younger people (13–14 years of age) are being “drug-tested”. If we start administering antidepressants to kids, they will never develop social competences – tools for interacting with the world.
Are they desensitizing us for good?
Yes, to put it bluntly they cut out the two ends of being. They not only deprive us of nasty areas of the registers, but also make us indifferent. Life after drugs is pedaling on a level ground, devoid of excitement, emotion or emotion. Our goal should be everyday life without medication.
It is said that you will not fall in love with taking antidepressants?
I don’t know anything about it. (Smile) Falling in love is F99 or mental disorder undefined (NOS) – such a joke. It is about very high emotional registers. Antidepressants will prevent us from doing this effectively – reducing all the sensations.
Overseas we have a new hurricane in pharmacology – it was fentanyl, the painkiller. Will it reach Poland?
He has already arrived. In Poland, the most common form of fentanyl are patches, which are given to many patients suffering from cancer or who require analgesic treatment for other reasons. They stay on the skin for three days before being thrown into the garbage. Then their second life begins. I will not give you ways to use them, because it would be irresponsible. Their secondary use often ends in overdosing or acute systemic infection.
Is it a legal drug?
Yes. Even though I have no medical indications for fentanyl patches, no one will punish me for it if I have them. There is no such recipe. Everything is technically fine. Why have drug prices dropped so much? Dealers have long understood that substances can be obtained legally. That’s why in the United States, heroin costs $ 3. Nothing.
Fentanyl is quickly addictive?
It all depends on the so-called individual response. Marek Kotański said that you only need to take it once to get into drug addiction. I think so too – if some substance very much distracts me, I will want this experience again and again … The problem is that it is never again like the first time.
In the United States, 140 people die from opioids a day. This is an insufficient warning?
Unfortunately, the “media scare” in the form of shocking statistics will not change much. It is no coincidence that the “fentanyl epidemic” is sweeping the world. We have a great need to get intoxicated – we simply cannot stand the pressure and look for easy solutions.
It seems that the image of the junkie has become very outdated?
Yes, this is no longer the wasted shadow of the man from the train station, it may well be a 13-year-old who does not accept himself. The stereotypical image of the addict and the substances we use has changed. We are often looking for higher registers. We are like a passenger who has changed to another car on the same train. Sometimes we stop drinking alcohol and instead take new doses of drugs: opioids, benzodiazepines, and antidepressants.
Have we stopped drowning our sorrows in alcohol?
In Poland, we should – like Donald Trump – introduce a state of emergency a long time ago, not only with regard to the opioid epidemic, but also alcohol and nicotine. Fentanyl works in the media: you only need to take it once and we have a dead body. Active smokers, although they are already dead, do not know about it. We have one billion people addicted to tobacco and about 30 million drug addicts worldwide. This statement speaks for itself. Nicotine is the only substance that kills people who have never smoked a cigarette in their life. There is no other … He is the perfect terrorist. We smoke in cars, houses, public places – at the bus stop, in front of the bank, in front of the hospital, on the school playground … We do not even realize that we are killing passersby into the cloud of smoke that follows us. It is “legal drama”.
Perhaps we should use the stick method and introduce prohibition?
I remember getting all kinds of psychoactive substances myself, and in those days there was no Internet. Prohibition is not always the golden mean. Restricting access can’t be the only thing to do – an addict will always find a way. However, it is also worth doing something in this area. In the USA and Western Europe, you will not buy alcohol at night. Additionally, in the US, liquor stores are located outside of city and town centers. In addition, alcohol is not sold to persons under the age of 21 and this is strictly adhered to. In Sweden, the number of bottles of vodka purchased by citizens is recorded. Nobody is particularly outraged by the fact that their civil rights are being restricted. Nothing will change if we don’t get to the root causes. We should consider why so many young people risk their lives to turn off the plug to their emotions? What about prophylaxis? The modern world has gone crazy and we all need to support each other emotionally. A legal or illegal drug is always in a deficit of some kind. Deficiencies in the emotional area. I am not experiencing something or I do not want to experience it … Maybe I cannot name it yet, but I know that there is too much of it. All messages that reach us from the outside world convince us that showing emotions is wrong. How can I accept myself, if I hear around, I hear: don’t cry, don’t get angry, don’t be afraid …
In the United States, they blame doctors who wrote prescriptions with a light hand …
This is the climate. We are in the era of symptomatic medicine – we need to remove the symptom: pimples, anxiety, lack of sleep … Few of us wonder what price we will have to pay. Let us not blame the doctors, let us not blame the parents, we all set such an example. There will always be a magic pill – a cure for all evil. We live in a world where the demand for the “wow effect” has reached its extreme. There is only one message from the media: if you are sick or have any bodily dysfunctions, be it somatic or mental, remove them immediately. Otherwise you will fall out of circulation – you will become unwelcome.
According to a study by the American Drug Control Institute, four out of five heroin users have previously abused legal drugs. Ends up with a syringe?
Marek Kotański said that not all those who smoked marijuana ended up taking heroin, but all those who used heroin were smoking marijuana. If I start taking drugs in a narcotic way, there is a syringe at the end and a real junkie. Nothing beats her in the power of sensation, the speed of killing, and the difficulty of weaning.
The milk has spilled, the question is what can we do?
First, it’s best not to go in. We need to understand that there is no safe use of psychoactive substances. Only 1/10 of people who started the therapy abstinence for over six years. Nine others are already dead. You have to be really lucky to meet the right people at the right time and place. I can go to therapy, stop taking drugs, and still do things like I’m high.
So what’s our way out?
It’s not about abstaining from drug use, it’s about living. We have to understand that there is no second place in our lives, although it also seems to be on the podium. For me, second place means one thing – you’re dead. Either you are the master or you are not. You have to do things like Polish Iron Man – Jurek Górski. Challenge yourself, reach new heights, cross the boundaries and limitations that are in our head. If you are a mechanic then be the best mechanic. If you are a cleaner, be the best at it. Not average – there are hundreds of them. I don’t mean the rat race, but acting on one’s own potential – a passion for life. This is what we all lack. Therefore, we look for relief outside, instead of finding relief in ourselves.