CDC director says they’re “poised” to do more gun research if Congress funds it
Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, says the CDC is “poised” for additional research on the causes of gun violence if Congress chooses to give it additional funding. According to Redfield, how the CDC prioritizes its spending is largely driven by where “Congress puts the priority to want to fund us.”
“We have a program called the National Violent Surveillance System… and so, we currently are recording violent deaths from all causes, including firearms. And so that is, that’s ongoing,” Redfield said.
In 1996, Congress passed the Dickey Amendment, which prohibits using public health funds to “advocate or promote gun control,” but earlier this year, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said he would instruct the CDC to conduct research on the causes of gun violence.
Asked what kind of constraints the CDC faces from that provision, Redfield said, “I don’t feel we have any restrictions to do research. The issue will be if Congress can give us funding to expand the research that we’re currently able to do. … The secretary has also made it clear that we do not have a restriction to do research. Basically, what we need to do is get a funding mechanism for Congress to instruct us to do that research.”
Redfield also spoke about what he considers considers the public health crisis of our time: the opioid epidemic. Preliminary CDC data shows the number of deadly drug overdoses nationwide has plateaued for six straight months even though more than 72,000 Americans died last year from drug overdoses. A little over 48,000 of those deaths were from opioids.
It’s a crisis that hits close home for Redfield.
“It’s personal to me. I think you know one of my six children almost died from cocaine that was contaminated with fentanyl,” Redfield told “CBS This Morning” co-host John Dickerson. “You know, my wife and I have a very supportive family. But my own son was in tears when he finally told us that he was using cocaine. And I didn’t understand, you know, why didn’t he come earlier? Well, because he was made to feel ashamed. … You know, who knows why he started using cocaine?
According to Redfield, we now know that 2 to 6 percent of people who get a single prescription for an opioid for routine procedures like wisdom tooth removal end up becoming chronically dependent.
“There’s a pathophysiological reason for addiction… and the more we can embrace that, not make people feel bad about it,” he said. “We don’t make people feel bad if they have cancer. We have to allow people to embrace the medical illnesses they have and help them get the best therapy treatment so that they can go on to a productive and happy life.”
Despite recent CDC numbers suggesting the rise in drug overdoses has leveled off, the CDC director said it is going to require “enormous effort” to get the epidemic under control.
“Well, I think, first and foremost, we have to recognize it for what it is. It’s a medical condition. It’s not a moral failing, right. And the second thing we have to recognize is it’s actually a chronic medical condition,” he said. “You know, I try to encourage people to support families like us that are trying to win the battle against opioid addiction. … Recognize that treatment success is possible. It should become the rule, not the exception.”
Now we have the head of the CDC and our Surgeon General – both medical doctors – that claims that addictions are mental/health issues but the DOJ is still functioning under their 1917 declaration that opiate addiction is a CRIME and not a DISEASE and the DOJ the only “treatment” that they have for treating addiction is jail/prison.
Yet today, and for several decades, the DEA has been licensing Methadone and Suboxone clinics to treat the CRIME of opiate addiction with medication(s).
Also since at least 1973 the DEA has claimed that Marijuana has NO MEDICINAL VALUE, but recently they have chosen to call for clinical trials to determine what medical benefits Marijuana could provide. Does this suggest that DEA’s claims that Marijuana had not medicinal value back in 1973…was not based on any valid medical data ?
What else has the DEA based their actions on “opinions” and not FACTS over the past 45 years ?
It is common knowledge that the vast majority of illegal drugs on the streets is coming from Mexico and China and has contributed to tens of thousands of deaths each year. Is it time that Congress pulls in the reigns in on the DEA and refocus their actions – or limit their actions – to focus their actions on those cartels that are flooding our streets with illegal drugs ?
Filed under: General Problems
I am not surprised that the overdose rate still climbs even after nationwide sweeping massive reduction in prescribed opiate medication. It is “my opinion” that if further sanctioning of opiate prescribed medication is involuntarily enforced, the overdose rate will climb even further. Purposely self inflicted overdose WILL continue to climb. Who, if any agency is realistically keeping suicide statistics and how far are these stats “spun” to favor further restrictions on medication that can be proven with…..documentation as beneficial medication for the treatment of never ending, intense, pain generation? Pain management patients treated successfully with opiate medication are THE easiest target for dot/gov to cite, “here is the problem” for ALL overdose. Maybe I am naive but, WHAT influence should CDC have over firearms? What connection does the CDC have to do with “gun research”? About as much of a “connection” as the DEA has to do with the practice of medicine? DOJ has arrested all of our physicians authority to treat both acute and “chronic” pain with the resources currently proved, and available, especially opiate medication prescribing in the manner that is truly beneficial to patients that are literally at the end of their rope. More and more statistical numbers keep presenting themselves that patients who as their last effective way to manage intolerable, lifetime pain wi h opiate medication are not the “cause” of increasing overdose. Realistic evidence is not being truthfully presented or is spun to favor further sanctioning of opiate medication. Evidence based truth is not coming to light. Suffering increases. AS a patient that has gained 23 years of gainful employment along with some social activities with responsibly prescribed opiate medication as the last means to effectively manage what is documented as lifetime pain generation, life has become disastrous.
There’s a pathophysiological reason for addiction… and the more we can embrace that, not make people feel bad about it,” he said. “We don’t make people feel bad if they have cancer. We have to allow people to embrace the medical illnesses they have and help them get the best therapy treatment so that they can go on to a productive and happy life hmm, cant the same be said 4 cpp’s? Or should i say, should? Words to live by, lol.
Good god, these morons can’t even get their lies right. “According to Redfield, we now know that 2 to 6 percent of people who get a single prescription for an opioid for routine procedures like wisdom tooth removal end up becoming chronically dependent.”
According to Redfield, who’s talking out his blowhole. Brat et al, British Medical Journal, 2018, who found a “…misuse event rate of 0.2% within one year” after acute opioid prescribing. “Our findings suggest that opioid naive patients who receive low to moderately high doses of analgesics for short durations have small associated increases in overall rates of misuse. Many studies have shown that pain is often poorly managed after surgery. Higher doses within standards of moderation may better saturate [opioid] receptors, whereas under-treatment of acute pain increases the risk of pseudoaddiction, chronic pain, and, potentially, overdose.”
In other words, UNDERTREATMENT of acute pain is a far greater problem and has much more dire consequences than effectively treating acute pain. This nonsense about going in for surgery & coming out 2 days later a raving addict is too asinine for fiction, but is parroted daily by hysterics and idiots. This is not to say it cannot ever happen, but the 0.2% who have a problem are highly likely to have a problem anyway. Forcing the other 99.8% of acute injury & surgical patients into literal torture is not even sane. And the more they undertreat acute pain, the guaranteed greater the population of chronic pain patients that this nation considers subhuman and unworthy of treatment, mercy, or life.