"dopesick" on hulu

[henrygandorf 29194]

 

starts next wed.

[C-Man 27239]

Wife was telling me about this last night

[XYZ 2154]

I can tell you how the real life show ends: the Sacklers win.

[Sbbruin 21865]

Watched the first ep last night.  Can tell it's gonna be good.  HBO's "The Crime of the Century" doc on the Purdue Pharma and Insys death push is fucking haunting.  Yes, as @XYZ states, the fact that no one went to jail is the real crime.  They destroyed entire communities.  

[NotActuallyALonghorn 4976]

Watched the first episode last week with the wife. Seems good.

[jeevsie 3737]

If I'm only picking one, the Hulu drama or HBO doc?

[BonzoMontreaux 1061]

32 minutes ago, jeevsie said:

If I'm only picking one, the Hulu drama or HBO doc?

Maybe the Hulu drama, so far they have done a decent job of capturing the mindset of the Sacklers and Purdue from what was captured in the HBO doc.

I want to say the Hulu drama actually goes into a little more detail on the study that was done when Purdue claimed their addiction rates to opioids.  So, to me , they compliment each other.

 

[Sbbruin 21865]

5 hours ago, jeevsie said:

If I'm only picking one, the Hulu drama or HBO doc?

I'd go HBO doc, as it's the real, and raw, deal.  Very rage inducing.  But the drama is entertainment as well.  And Michael Keaton continues to show he has top tier acting chops.  And with this being our second straight Hulu show we've been watching (after "Only Murders in the Building"), I just switched to the full Hulu plan.  The commercials were pissing me off.  They space them out quite a bit at first, then the start shrinking the spacing tighter and tighter.  

Edited October 28, 2021 by Sbbruin

[Sgt Hulk 13816]

Watching it now. Makes me rage. Continue my stance on fuck the FDA. I should have joined these lawsuits years ago my father died because of this shit after a failed back surgery and they drs kept pumping him wit this trash. If I ever come across a sackler I’m tearing their throat out and feeding it to them 

[henrygandorf 29194]

new episode tonight.  definitely rage-inducing (much like the hbo doc).  i don't think this is a "one or the other" type of show.  if you enjoyed one, you'll enjoy the other.  they're totally different.

so far the acting has been outstanding and i'm really liking the show, despite the content.  michael keaton is cruising towards an emmy.  kaitlyn dever has also been fantastic, as always.

[Sgt Hulk 13816]

This female sales rep I also want to see her as a character no longer alive lol 

[C-Man 27239]

We are through six of the eight now. What a fantastic -- and infuriating -- series. Jesus, this is an enthralling miniseries. Well done, Barry Levinson.

I knew this Oxy/Purdue shit was bad but it's even worse than I thought. Shit. One of my closest friends, a HS/UT grad, died of a heroin overdose back in 2013 or so. Attorney in Houston and doing life well, had a bad neck/shoulder surgery that resulted in MRSA and nearly died. He got hooked on OxyContin and then transitioned to heroin as it became easier to get and one night overdosed during a neighborhood block party on their cul-de-sac.

Fuck the Sacklers.

[Parliament 14276]

How close to the true story is it?

[Bateshorn 9928]

If this is your jam, I strongly recommend “Empire of Pain”by Patrick Madden Keefe. 
 

The Sacklers aren’t just guilty, they knew exactly what they were doing every step of the way and did it with intent and enthusiasm.  They are pure evil and are going to get away with it.

Edited December 16, 2021 by Bateshorn

[BonzoMontreaux 1061]

9 hours ago, Parliament said:

How close to the true story is it?

I would say pretty damn close.  I watched 'Crime of the Century' and then this.  I think there are at least 1 or 2 things in the mini-series that were true that didn't get brought up in 'Crime of the Century'. 

Spoiler

On a side note, when my daughter was in the hospital a couple of weeks ago, I was noticing the pain level chart (faces expressing levels of discomfort) when the nurse walks in and asks her "What's your pain level?"  - i.e. the 'Fifth Vital Sign'.  Both introduced by Purdue.

 

[Bama Chick 28596]

How close to the true story is it?

The Sackler bits are dramatized scenes based on actual true events.

The DoJ and DEA and other famous folks (fucking Guiliani) are real.

The Doctor (Michael Keaton) and Betsy (gal who got hooked after mining accident) and other addicts and the main drug reps are composite characters based on multiple people and their stories.

[Bama Chick 28596]

If this is your jam, I strongly recommend “Empire of Pain”by Patrick Madden Keefe. 
 
The Sacklers aren’t just guilty, they knew exactly what they were doing every step of the way and did it with intent and enthusiasm.  They are pure evil and are going to get away with it.

Welllllll……..

[TonyTexas 10519]

Good. If they’re not going to jail then take away everything they own. 

[Parliament 14276]

One episode in, and this has a "Chernobyl" feel.

[mchookem 16344]

the FDA was so fucking complicit thru this whole thing. incredible.

[Druggist 303]

Don’t forget med schools and pharmacy schools.  I attended UT pharmacy around the turn of the century. It was rated #2 back then and has always been at least top 4.

I remember distinctly being taught by a world renowned expert that if opioid pain medications are prescribed and used properly for legitimate pain, there was no chance of addiction.  I remember thinking it didn’t sound right, but that is how I answered on the exam, because grades.

It pisses me off that I paid to be fed that horseshit.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

I have watched both.  The HBO is "just the facts, ma'am," while this is highly dramatized.

One thing I didn't remember, or maybe know, was that Arthur Sackler, the "patriarch" of the family, also marketed Valium and came up with this basic strategy.  

Great cast, well done.  The timeline gets a bit confusing, though.  They show what period they're doing, by year, before starting a scene that changes timeframe.  But it's a little hard to keep track of what's what.  Probably good enough to know we're going back or jumping forward.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

On 12/21/2021 at 9:09 AM, Druggist said:

Don’t forget med schools and pharmacy schools.  I attended UT pharmacy around the turn of the century. It was rated #2 back then and has always been at least top 4.

I remember distinctly being taught by a world renowned expert that if opioid pain medications are prescribed and used properly for legitimate pain, there was no chance of addiction.  I remember thinking it didn’t sound right, but that is how I answered on the exam, because grades.

It pisses me off that I paid to be fed that horseshit.

Outside of addiction specialists, there isn't much real understanding of addiction even in the medical and related fields.

I think there is some validity to the notion that if one is in acute pain, and taking an opiate/opioid, there's a lessened chance of addiction. No chance is a severe overstatement.  But once that dose persists beyond acute pain into something better handled with analgesics or NSAIDs, it's danger, Will Robinson, danger.

And, as is the case with Oxy, and pretty much everything else, when it's prescribed for non-acute pain, forget about it.

[C-Man 27239]

37 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

I have watched both.  The HBO is "just the facts, ma'am," while this is highly dramatized.

One thing I didn't remember, or maybe know, was that Arthur Sackler, the "patriarch" of the family, also marketed Valium and came up with this basic strategy.  

Great cast, well done.  The timeline gets a bit confusing, though.  They show what period they're doing, by year, before starting a scene that changes timeframe.  But it's a little hard to keep track of what's what.  Probably good enough to know we're going back or jumping forward.

That drove me nuts during this. They'd show a year on the screen and then slip back or forward and move the "dial" accordingly. Just show me the year on the screen for the scene we're about to watch.

 

31 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Outside of addiction specialists, there isn't much real understanding of addiction even in the medical and related fields.

I think there is some validity to the notion that if one is in acute pain, and taking an opiate/opioid, there's a lessened chance of addiction. No chance is a severe overstatement.  But once that dose persists beyond acute pain into something better handled with analgesics or NSAIDs, it's danger, Will Robinson, danger.

And, as is the case with Oxy, and pretty much everything else, when it's prescribed for non-acute pain, forget about it.

Maybe. But I think the thing with OxyContin was the time-delay didn't work like they said. It was supposed to slow release over 12 hours but it was going much, much quicker than that. Then the addicts started sucking the time-lapse coating off of it or crushing it and snorting it.

The Sacklers belong behind fucking bars.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

16 hours ago, C-Man said:

That drove me nuts during this. They'd show a year on the screen and then slip back or forward and move the "dial" accordingly. Just show me the year on the screen for the scene we're about to watch.

 

Maybe. But I think the thing with OxyContin was the time-delay didn't work like they said. It was supposed to slow release over 12 hours but it was going much, much quicker than that. Then the addicts started sucking the time-lapse coating off of it or crushing it and snorting it.

The Sacklers belong behind fucking bars.

I've never bought the time-release thing as anti-addictive.  Circumventing it made it apparently a fun drug to abuse.

It's my theory, and I think there's some backup for it, that one of the fundamental mechanisms of addiction is that the opioid receptors in the brain and body get overstimulated due to a prolonged presence of opiates/oids and when the drug is removed, they go crazy, creating cravings and sickness.  I think when you're actually in pretty acute pain, that doesn't happen.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

Trying to sort out some of the fact from fiction in the series, I stumbled on this article https://reason.com/2021/11/17/dopesick-reinforces-these-pernicious-misconceptions-about-opioids-addiction-and-pain-treatment/

It raises some interesting points.  Namely, that Oxy was a relatively small fraction of the opiates sold during the crisis, and, there's nothing, other than packing a lot of oxycodone in a single pill, that fundamentally differentiates it from other opiates and opiods.

The series does rather heavily imply that taking Oxy is like a death sentence.  Which is actually probably not true, any moreso than a "perc" or a "vike."

But the fact remains that Purdue changed the way narcotic pain meds were prescribed, and, of course, they lied their asses off about the properties of Oxycontin.

It seems like some of the research they pumped extended the willingness of docs to prescribe other, similar pills.  Or maybe the manufacturers of the more standard pills used that notion to pump more of their own.  I haven't really heard of that, though, just irresponsible flooding of the channels with the pills.

I have to wonder, too, if the condition of the country made it primed, or ripe for something like this.

[henrygandorf 29194]

my take was it was more about the aggressive marketing than the ingredients. especially when marketing/sales were based on research and studies funded and fabricated by the supplier in order to increase sales (not treat pain, though it also did that).

it’s like they took the sleaziest field, like timeshare sales, and applied it to medicine. dozens of red flags. 

[Parliament 14276]

Were they the first to hire hot chicks and former college athletes to sell their drugs?

[Hozz 1017]

I thought this was a great show.  My only real complaint was the way they jumped around years 10 times an episode.  I wish it was presented in a linear timeline start to finish.

[henrygandorf 29194]

i understand the gripes about the time jumps, but i thought it was incredibly impressive how they were able to keep 6-7 completely different parts of the story going at the same time.  it's not like there were crazy reveals and twists that the non-linear storytelling interfered with.  they presented the information in the most coherent way for a viewer to digest, much like they would in a book, which this is based on.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

2 hours ago, Parliament said:

Were they the first to hire hot chicks and former college athletes to sell their drugs?

Definitely not.  That was endemic in the pharma industry going back to at least the mid-80s.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

18 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

i understand the gripes about the time jumps, but i thought it was incredibly impressive how they were able to keep 6-7 completely different parts of the story going at the same time.  it's not like there were crazy reveals and twists that the non-linear storytelling interfered with.  they presented the information in the most coherent way for a viewer to digest, much like they would in a book, which this is based on.

Yeah, the jumps didn't bother me much.  I was grateful for the indication that hey, we're going forward or back in time.  But I did find myself trying to remember what year was what.

Just putting it out there, but I think Randy Ramseyer was my favorite character.

Also, I got a kick out of Randy and Rick calling Brownlee "sir."  I guess that's common in the hierarchy of US Attorneys offices, where the USA may be a much younger and less experienced attorney than many in the office s/he runs.  Particularly in the case of Brownlee, who was like 7 or 8 years out of law school when he got the appointment, although older due to military service.

Edited December 25, 2021 by TwiceHorn

[Harrison Bergeron 1798]

So this is a story about big pharma colluding with federal officials and doctors to push drugs to drive big pharma profits ... and there were experts that misled the public? Seems fishy to me.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

1 hour ago, Harrison Bergeron said:

So this is a story about big pharma colluding with federal officials and doctors to push drugs to drive big pharma profits ... and there were experts that misled the public? Seems fishy to me.

Are you expressing legit incredulousness?  I think the facts are pretty well documented.

First, it demonstrates what's known as "agency capture," whereby executive agencies become enmeshed with the entities they regulate.  I think certain of the agencies, FDA and SEC come to mind immediately, are more subject to it than others, USPTO for example.  One of the prime causes of it is favorable employment for agency employees post-agency.

Second, as far as experts, as mentioned above, the medical profession is no more above ignorance of addiction than the rest of the world.  Contempt for addicts, as well. And addiction is poorly understood. They got pain specialists whose views of pain treatment were myopic, and in some cases pretty fringey, for example the pseudo-addiction guy.   Plus, they throw a few million their way and they're happy to shade their opinions.

Finally, Purdue was exceptionally brazen about essentially bribing the above two types, and anyone else that could potentially oppose them, for example the Maine US Attorney, and also about flat lying to doctors and patients about the hazards of their drug.

The FDA is a problematic agency.  I don't think anyone can argue in good faith that it should not exist or should have less authority than it does, except in some very narrow areas (granting patent-like exclusivity to new drugs, for example).  But, like some/many/all government agencies, it is subject to being outsmarted by its "customers," new drug applicants.  This is particularly so because the testing requirements necessarily involve some cooperation between the applicant and the application reviewers, and the testing and data is subject to manipulation and subjective interpretation.

Edited December 25, 2021 by TwiceHorn

[PenelopeWitherspoon 19134]

Watching this now.  Infuriating.  

[Nice Guy Eddie 13515]

bump. I'm been meaning to catch this series and finally started this weekend. Very difficult to not binge every episode as quickly as possible.

I'm sure the writers took license but the term pseudo-addition infuriated me. "Hey, the so-called addict isn't experiencing real withdrawal symptoms, it's the underlying pain. They need more oxy and the symptoms will go away."

fun fact: the creator of Dopesick, Danny Strong, wrote or co-wrote the episodes and directed a couple of them. But I think he's best known to the public as the smarmy secretary of the treasury in Billions. I hate people that are this talented.

[TwiceHorn 31515]

22 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

bump. I'm been meaning to catch this series and finally started this weekend. Very difficult to not binge every episode as quickly as possible.

I'm sure the writers took license but the term pseudo-addition infuriated me. "Hey, the so-called addict isn't experiencing real withdrawal symptoms, it's the underlying pain. They need more oxy and the symptoms will go away."

fun fact: the creator of Dopesick, Danny Strong, wrote or co-wrote the episodes and directed a couple of them. But I think he's best known to the public as the smarmy secretary of the treasury in Billions. I hate people that are this talented.

Did not realize that about Danny Strong.

I think "pseudo-addiction" may have some basis in reality in that, I believe if people are in actual acute pain, the potential for addiction is "minimized."  The question though, and the probably impossible "trick," is when to stop taking the addictive substance and just eat the pain, or use analgesics instead.  The use of the concept of "pseudo addiction" to prolong opiate dosage was bullshit of the purest ray serene.

While withdrawal symptoms are an indicator of addiction, they're not the sine qua non.  Anyone who takes an addictive substance long enough or in sufficient quantity will experience withdrawal symptoms, but that does not mean they're addicted.  Sometimes people call this "physically addicted," as opposed to "psychologically addicted."  I don't think I like those terms, because full blown addiction has physiological and psychological components beyond withdrawal, at least as far as we know.

I also have a theory that a lot of the "addict" victims of the opiate crisis are not full-blown addicts, but rather have taken long enough/in sufficient quantities that they experience withdrawal, probably in many cases along with pain, and aren't willing/able to deal with them.  The critical difference being that a "full-blown addict" can be very clear of withdrawal symptoms and still relapse because they are genetically and environmentally disposed to addiction.  In contrast, I theorize that a lot of the "recent batch" of opiate addicts would probably be free of drugs if they could just get past the withdrawal and deal with any pain without narcotics.

One of the reasons I believe in this theory is that full-blown addicts are believed to be somewhere between 10-20% of the population (I tend to take the higher number), and the recent batch of opiate addicts seem to far exceed that number, but it's hard to analyze this.

But there is also an unsettled question about whether someone can "use" their way into full-blown addiction without being genetically/environmentally susceptible.  There is some evidence that addicts have a different brain structure and that use of intoxicants continues to modify that brain structure in such a way as to promote addiction.  It's unclear whether use of intoxicants alone can do that, without the preexisting structure. 

Edited June 14, 2022 by TwiceHorn

[Parliament 14276]

1 hour ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

bump. I'm been meaning to catch this series and finally started this weekend. Very difficult to not binge every episode as quickly as possible.

I'm sure the writers took license but the term pseudo-addition infuriated me. "Hey, the so-called addict isn't experiencing real withdrawal symptoms, it's the underlying pain. They need more oxy and the symptoms will go away."

fun fact: the creator of Dopesick, Danny Strong, wrote or co-wrote the episodes and directed a couple of them. But I think he's best known to the public as the smarmy secretary of the treasury in Billions. I hate people that are this talented.

He was good in Mad Men too.

[henrygandorf 29194]

3 hours ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

I hate people that are this talented.

yeah, i went to an agency screening of spotlight years ago and met the writer/director, tom mccarthy.  and i was like, oh, i thought you were just a mediocre actor (the wire season 5, etc) and you are, but crap you're really good at other stuff.  that's what i was thinking, not saying out loud, clearly.