But what are the the criteria to decide legitimacy of those needs? Pain is a symptom. It is your body signaling a problem. Indeed, sometimes, there are no solution to those problems but I doubt that all those who got prescribed opioids and got addicted didn't have an underlying solvable problem.
If you are obese because you eat too much and your knees hurt, the solution is not an opioid. The whole discourse about pain being a condition that must be addressed is nefarious. Except in some pretty rare case (like terminal illness), pain is a symptom for which the healthcare organizations must find the root cause of and treat properly. Using expedient like opioids is a recipe for failure and a problem of that only the medical community can address. Serious introspection for those in charge of healthcare system in the US (and many other countries) is necessary.
Also, serious failures of the FDA for labeling opioids as not addictive and putting the breaks on fixing it for years.
> I doubt that all those who got prescribed opioids and got addicted didn't have an underlying solvable problem.
The US health care system is set up to cause exactly these kinds of issues. If you're in pain because of a bad hip, if you're uninsured, it may be much cheaper to just buy pain killers in stead of getting surgery. Once you get used to the pills, the pain is even worse if you stop taking them and might get withdrawals.
Opioids are indispensable in cancer treatment and after many surgeries. In some cases they can be used to combat chronic pain or leading up to surgery. But you're right, they shouldn't be a replacement.
If the US wants to fix this epidemic, just decreasing sales of opioids won't be enough, they'll have to provide the alternative. If people can't get affordable health care, they'll get affordable pain killers.
You seem to have made up the example of obese knees with no prior knowledge of what actually causes opioid prescription as evidence that it “might” not have good foundations. You realize that’s backwards right? Throwing out a made up example with no idea if it’s representative is just distracting. This entire post would be better reduced to “what are the most common reasons for legitimate opioid prescription”
Opioids are also prescribed for short term healing from major surgery, of which there is no root cause beyond having major surgery or other painful injury.
