Was that true in 2017?

You can but a 2 pack of naloxone for about $50 now over the counter, less with insurance. And many health departments hand them out for free.

If anyone needs this information you can still get naloxene for free through some pharmacies and doctor's offices in the USA. They ask you to fill out a questionnaire, but it doesn't cost anything. I acknowledge this is also likely a state by state thing and it isn't offered everywhere. Still worth asking, though!

We're in the bad place

...then Oracle acquired the companies that make fentanyl and naloxone.

I don't call this Capitalism so much as political demonizing of "the other" - get a few beers in 'em and then ask: "well, don't those junkies deserve to die anyway? I mean, aren't we all better off with them gone?" And they'll say yes, sometimes even when it's their own brother/sister or daughter/son or father/mother who is the addict, but they get strangely quiet when it's themselves.

It's also literally how supply and demand work. Demand for the medicine is increasing, thus they raise the price. No ethics needed. That's why it's fucked up. Capitalism doesn't consider the drug addicts less worth - it doesn't consider them at all.

Very confusing to see this post receive support on an anarchist community.

Now that's how you socialize costs.

Yeah, but these kinds of price swings aren't suppy and demand driven, they're agenda driven.

Product integration!

stop trying to make me depressed with 10 year old news.

Don't forget the fact it was the same pharmaceuticals that got people addicted to begin with...

That’s not true. Look at similar spikes in insulin and other lifesaving medicines, for example.

That’s not true.

Different, yet similar, agendas.

What agenda do you think drove the "masks are for sissies" COVID response?

We have plenty of capacity to make all the insulin we need and more, it's a more profitable business when there's short supply. We have an infinite capacity for greed.

We have plenty of capacity to make all the insulin we need and more, it's a more profitable business when there's short supply. We have an infinite capacity for greed.

Exactly, that is free market capitalism.

What agenda do you think drove the "masks are for sissies" COVID response?

That one I’m not sure about, but I can’t think of a way it’s money related. However, the prevalence and cost of masks definitely went up during the pandemic, as most people did mask up. Some other supplies also went up in price, like microphones and cameras for computers as everyone started working from home.

I can’t think of a way it’s money related.

Just use the tiniest bit of imagination.... how many boomers are out there spending down their retirement savings on healthcare and nursing homes? How many of their (fiscally eager to advance) children aren't too upset that they inherited early, before it was spent down, because the disease that kills old people - unfortunately - took out dear old mumsy and pop who swore they'd never give them a dime until they died?

most people did mask up

That wasn't my experience in Floriduh.

That wasn't my experience in Floriduh.

It depends heavily on the location. It was basically split right down party lines. Blue areas were like 90% masked, red areas were like 90% unmasked.

Just use the tiniest bit of imagination....

I’m trying not to stoop to the level of conspiracy theories. Even so, I don’t think your explanation makes any sense. How would the younger generations, especially those without money, contribute to the right wing propaganda that championed anti-masking ideas? Not to mention that most people care about their relatives for more than just their money.

The whole anti-masking things makes more sense to me as part of the long-running trend of anti-science propaganda from the right. Maybe that’s driven by oil companies because anti-science attitudes drive climate change denialism. But it also might just be the effects of the social issues that spun off of these things.

One curious anechdote - my dad was heavily questioning masking during COVID but I don’t remember him questioning masking when our town was full of smoke from wildfires from a few hundred miles north.

How would the younger generations, especially those without money, contribute to the right wing

The right wing (and left) do things to endear "their base" to them come next election. Our direct neighbors are just one example of many: felt strongly that they should be treating their father - in hospital with COVID - with Ivermectin. They were raging against "the system" that withheld Ivermectin from them for his treatment, and ecstatic when they finally got him transferred to an institution that would respect their wishes. He and his wife left this earth a couple of months later, and now they are owners of the rental properties they used to just manage for their parents, they also spend most of their time traveling. How do you think they'll be voting this go around?

The number of people aged 40-60 I know who aren't on speaking terms with their parents, but still on-track to inherit their parents' wealth when they die is astoundingly high. They support policies such as eliminating inheritance taxes, passive income taxes, etc. etc. and they will vote for candidates who promise to do that.

I read your other comments and you seem informed and aware of a lot, I just don't see how you can reflect on such and decide it isn't ultimately driven by capitalism?

All of the "othering" you've witnessed and are (I think accurately) describing - that human tendency toward incoherent tribalistic behaviors and worldviews - that's baked into us, no disagreement there. But it's the capitalists who leverage it so successfully against us all and have made it the force that it is, here and today.

Like yeah the phenomena is real pretty much as you're describing, and it results from, is intentionally amplified by (doesn't just incidentally feed into) the way we are choosing to run our society. Capitalism + basic human nature = what we're all watching.

Not being a jerk. How does capitalism get off the hook as a primary cause here?

A free market isn't the only way to oppose social hierarchies. Anarchist is just an umbrella term for people who don't believe in one particular thing. Most of them have one proposal or another for deciding who does which tasks.

B-Bu.. But Steam is loading a few percentages faster now because of competition from Epic Games Launcher..

Which is just "good business practice". If there's no demand for your product, create it.

In Canada I can walk into any drugstore and get a free naloxone kit. I have no drug addicts in my family and I still have one because my parents kept grabbing one when they would pickup their prescriptions lol

Wtf is going on down there buddy?

I don't view capitalism as the primary cause, but more as the excuse. We don't have free unfettered capitalism, there are price controls, labor regulations, every kind of distortion of capitalism: when it serves the agendas at play. When the agenda doesn't care to protect a certain class, like diabetics with not much money, then the agenda lets capitalism run wild.

So, sure, blame capitalism - it's what happens when you let people decide how much profit they want in combination with IP protections and monopoly markets. That way you don't have to point the finger at a "communist" central planning committee that arbitrarily decided the price for something. In the end, it's still people making decisions. As the song goes: when you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.

The free market at it's most free

No one’s trying to "make you depressed".

It’s a meme with an example of the failings of capitalism, not a news post.

No one’s trying to "make you depressed".

Working class apathy is absolutely a goal of the capitalists.

In the USA you can arrest every CEO of every for profit company and still be sure that you did not accidentally arrest an innocent person

Steam does not participate in the free market because it's not publicly traded

Greedy people flocked here because they saw an opportunity to extract more money from the proletariat.

Apathy yes. Though reducing depression to apathy is problematic. And this isn’t a post by a capitalist but a post criticisng capitalism in an anarchist community. (sorry in advance for being a pedant lol, but I feel it was sort of unfair insinuating OP and the meme had that purpose).

I just feel like regulating drugs is "government" on a technical level, even if you call it "community discouragement" or any other euphemism.

It's the Free to Rip You Off Market.

And this is why science is getting a bad name. I can kinda understand why there is scepticism on the field, especially vaccine. When explained why vaccine is not pure snakes oil, a retort could be "Oh yeah? Those times when pharmaceuticals did such and such..."

Wasn't it Martin Shekreli or another asswipe said that it was a moral duty of pharma makers to charge as much as possible for medication?

I highly recommend carrying some if you can get it, you never know where you might encounter an overdose and you could save a life.

Exactly!

Not a single Sackler in jail

If money can be made on an activity, then it MUST be made. Murica.

The American medical system has been openly screwing people over for decades. It's hard to instill trust in things like vaccines when people are repeatedly treated that way.

I don't blame the doctors, or the nurses, or the scientists. They are generally doing the best they can in a shitty system. I blame the people who built the system to intentionally be shitty: The administrators, owners, and politicians.

Yeah same as Australia,

Our free market is just free

There's no such thing as a "free market" in the USA. Like, just look at venture capital ventures: they blow a wad of cash, bloat out competition, ratchet up prices, and profit. The fact that it requires so much capital automatically dissolves most competition, not much of a free market. Also, we'd need to deregulate to have a free market because one thing that disbars competition is the hurdles to even enter the market due to regulations, but regulations are there...like safety regulations, which were written in blood and lawsuits.

We totally have free ones, maybe it varies by state?

people should have a right to life saving drugs. Our country was designed to protect the right to profit, but not the right to live.

if you are the sole supplier and suddenly people "need" your good you can charge almost whatever you want.

You seem to just be using your own definitions of capitalism and communism. It's probably not worth bickering much about, but what you're saying doesn't make sense. Not in the way where I think you're wrong and I disagree, in the way that your argument isn't coherent enough to refute.

Pharma does this all the time. What's even worse is they will buy the nda/patent and trial it for a completely different application, refile and get a year of exclusivity as the first generic on the market. And the price will skyrocket.

I spent almost two decades working for Tycho, Covidien, Mallinckrodt, GSK/Haleon and several more. The only thing redeeming was the people at the bottom. The rest is just shit all the way up.

definitions of capitalism and communism. It’s probably not worth bickering much about

If anything, that's my core point. Whatever definition you try to put on capitalism or communism, you won't find it practiced like that. Our economies are dictated by legislation, executive orders, judicial decisions, corporate actions both inside and outside the law. Labels like capitalism and communism are more window dressing than actual function.

your argument isn’t coherent enough to refute.

Which is my position regarding people saying "this is capitalism."

Not just the US