Letter to the DEA

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(This is my comment to the DEA regarding their Opioid Manufacturing Quotas, which you can comment on yourself, the cutoff is November 17th)
To the DEA & Law Enforcement in general,
My name is Peter Pischke; I’m an independent health reporter. I am also a chronic pain patient with severe disability caused by among other things, idiopathic intractable chronic pancreatitis, which is severely undertreated due to the impossible regulatory regiment the DEA has led the way in creating. Through my work, I’ve talked to so many individuals and families with members that are denied access to pain medication. Ten years ago, most of these patients, under the watchful eyes of their physicians, would have been able to obtain access to their necessary pain medications.
Today practically all are unable to obtain them.
Included in my comment is an article I wrote in March that still broadly applies here. The DEA quotas are extremely unwise and damaging to millions of Americans. The DEA has admitted on record that they have no way to measure if any of their actions curb the opioid crisis via quotas, stopping manufacturers/suppliers and more. DEA officials have been caught threatening members of Congress. They are routinely persecuting and threatening physicians and patients. Their behavior at the national and local level is abominable, and everyone involved with this organization should hang their head in shame.
The evidence is out, overdose deaths are skyrocketing, and studies show the main component is patients’ inability to access pain medication. The push by state actors to use general nuisance laws and threats in the media has failed. You’ve taken a law-abiding population using safe-supply drugs and pushed them into the black market with accompanying fentanyl and addiction. Indeed studies now show the connection between patients and addiction is slim at best. Even the project to solve addiction by settlement funds is an abject failure.
Your actions have not only failed to stop overdose deaths but have incurred more of them. There is no scientific, moral, or policy evidence justifying your actions against millions of innocent, law-abiding Americans.
So many suicides, suffering, and worsening health conditions can be traced directly to your policy efforts and the grotesque actions you have engaged in. You keep trying to stop the overdose crisis by withholding medications, and all it does is make the situation worse. The sacrifice millions have made, without their consent, to stop this crisis by your stratagem has failed.
There will not be any victory against addiction and overdose deaths as long as you continue to persecutive and destroy those whose lives never fed the overdose crisis. These are the actions of people who refuse to admit that the basic principles they work under are rotten to their core.
My role is as a journalist. I gather and report information. I know the issues of addiction and substance abuse are critical. But you will never solve this side of the human condition when you are punishing a population that has absolutely nothing to do with it. I pray to God that wisdom, truth, and justice be done. Because it certainly will never come from the United States Drug Enforcement Administration,
Sincerely,
– Peter Pischke
Independent Journalist and Disabled American
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Great letter; 8 milligrams of Buprenorphine 3X day, with pregabalin if you have neuropathy. 90MME is deamonic; not sane medicine of a God given plant. That may be the only workable and available option for you now. Our machines allow us to move faster than the human body is meant to; and medicine and nutrition is allowing us to live longer with horribly painful diseases. The "opioid crisis" as to legal pain medication doesn’t exist; odd that as legal pain medication was suppressed, heroin flooded the world. When I hear reports of rising opioid overdose deaths, it can only be heroin/fentanyl caused by crude dosing. Let my doctor go.
Thanks for posting on this substack-I’ll be following you closely! I love this letter. I’m glad to see this movement picking up steam. I’m going to add a little letter of my own :).
What the DEA did under the guise of “opioid crisis intervention” was unconscionable. They knew they weren’t saving lives. They shut down the real pill mills within 6 months. They knew they couldn’t convict a responsible doctor of a crime because they weren’t breaking any laws. DEA were using a flimsy CDC recommendation & bully tactics to reduce the number of opioids prescribed, regardless of disability, disease, pain level & type, years on opioids & dosages. Most notable was our adherence to strict rules and guidelines set by our doctors that included monthly in person appointments with drug tests that analyzed metabolites not just “opioid – positive,” random pill counts & drug tests that required patients to be in the clinic within 24-48 hours with all meds & ready to pee in a cup. And you better not be one pill short. Yet, we get labeled “addicts,” “pill seekers,” and “at risk.”
I nearly lost my life because my responsible attentive caring doctor was threatened with DEA investigations that would lead to financial ruin. Sure, maybe he would get charges dismissed or acquitted (if they could manage to create something to charge him with). But these lawsuits cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, require resources like extra staff, and take attention away from the patient by forcing the doctor to appear at erroneous court dates (with attorney in tow). He’s a neurologist treating MS patients. He can’t risk losing his practice, so like all the others, he had to give in. And I had my meds cut by 2/3 overnight. What followed was the worst 18 months of my life.
Fortunately I have very good luck with Suboxone, the only opioid you can get now with some luck if you’re under 40. It’s actually been a blessing. But I’m now stuck with the stigma of what that drug was designed & indicated for – opioid use disorder. Not chronic pain. And yes I have a problem with that. YOU gave me that label 5 years ago. But I am luckier than many I know. I’ve seen so many tragic stories. Lives lost. Dreams shattered. Purpose stolen. All for what? What did you accomplish?
We’re on track to set a record number of overdoses this year so congrats on once again implementing failing policies. Opioid deaths from fentanyl have spiked, while all other opioid related deaths have decreased, including those involving “prescription opioids.” Graphs found here ( https://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-topics/trends-statistics/overdose-death-rates ) are evidence of your failure. How many people have suffered? I wish 1000 times the suffering upon you or better yet, someone you love. This wasn’t an honest mistake made with good intentions. It was torture sanctioned by the almighty CDC.
Personally, I see no need for DEA or CDC. The federal government is nothing but bloat and waste; bureaucracies with too much unilateral power. When the US has a competent president back in the White House, I’ll do everything in my power to cut your budget & make you prove you deserve to even keep your jobs. I’m only one person but our movement is growing. We are uniting. There are thousands, maybe millions who’ve had it just as bad if not worse than I have. We’re sick of being treated like junkies or criminals. We’re sick!
YOU ARE THE CRIMINALS DEA & CDC.
GET OUT OF OUR DOCTORS OFFICES.
DO YOUR ACTUAL JOB.
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