U.S. Surgeon GeneralVerified account

Sir, if you're not ok with letting ppl die, why are #cancer patients being denied pain relief when #pain is known to exacerbate existing health conditions as well as causing others? Why are 50,000 addicts more important than 50+ MILLION #veterans, #chronicpain & #cancer patients?

Those are great questions. You’d think he might want to engage in conversations with chronic/intractable pain patients. @Surgeon_General our lives are important too.

FYI @ravensspirit68 knows far more about this subject than you. She’s been studying & advocating around this issue on a volunteer basis for six *years*. You should listen to her. I know I learned a lot!

Imagine if they got their boots up off MDs & pain patients neck &actually spent all the BILLIONS UPON BILLIONS of 'opioid crisis' moneies on improving ADX tx & buying Naloxone to give out to people at recovery centers. Instead they spend it on 'mindfulness' studies & PDMPs.

There’s a huge diff btwn having it available vs pushing it onto #cpp who’ve r successfully managed w/#opioids #benzos etc. Drs forcing Naloxone onto us bc we r labeled as ‘high risk’ detrimentally flags us as ‘addicts’ which we r NOT. Most of us hv history to prove we aren’t.

The problem isn’t the Drs forcing the naloxone, it’s the insurance companies requiring it for PAs... ALL caused by the gvmt’s ridiculous restrictions now placed. I see both sides of the coin, I give OD pts Narcan on my ambulance and work for a 1/

#naloxone being forced on #cpp on top of PDMP, pain contracts, excessive dr visits, pill counts and urine tests... Opioid medications denied to terminal and cancer pts because they addict... ...yet addicts in treatment get unlimited #suboxone because withdrawal is painful...

I am happy Naloxone is saving people’s lives. I am not happy that 100% of our government’s focus is on addicts. Can Veterans in pain and chronic pain patients have at least 50% focus? That would be a nice start.