Lockdown Mania vs the PeopleUnfortunately, the suffering continues in the form of PTSD and addiction.
By Art Kleinschmidt
March 20, 2022
Has anyone ever wondered what drug dealers did during COVID related lockdowns? Or how people struggling with substance abuse were affected? Dealers kept selling and people suffered. Even though drugs, alcohol, and marijuana remained readily available, many treatment centers had to shut down, peer recovery groups and mutual aid networks were shuttered, as churches were unavailable to meet the needs of those reaching out for help. Prolonged lockdowns were a petri dish for addiction and adverse mental health conditions.
In December 2021, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky announced that the COVID-19 isolation mandates were implemented based upon what people could “tolerate.” This statement indicates that the COVID-19 remediation policies and mandated restrictions made assumptions about human behavior, and were not solely based in the physical sciences of epidemiology and virology. Americans in many parts of the country are just now, after two years, emerging from draconian COVID policies, and the hard data support the notion that the “tolerance levels” for many vulnerable people were greatly exceeded. The CDC has reported that during the lockdowns our nation experienced the highest level of drug overdose deaths in history, with over 100,000 fatalities.
Furthermore, the CDC reported in June 2020 that Americans were experiencing increased symptoms of declining mental health. In assessing “tolerance” the CDC seemed to ignore its own survey data as 31.9 percent of respondents reported increases in anxiety and depression, 40 percent reported to be suffering from at least one adverse mental health condition, 26 percent said they were experiencing trauma, and another 13 percent reported an increase in substance abuse to cope with negative stress. A reasonable person could ask why this information wasn’t considered in assessing the tolerance levels of vulnerable people. One doesn’t need a medical degree to know that increasing mood-altering substance use to offset negative feelings will likely either exacerbate existing substance use disorder or create one.
If the extended lockdowns weren’t distressing enough, the media chipped in by running a 24/7 COVID death-o-meter. This graphic was a permanent fixture on TV screens throughout the nation. Viewers were barraged with an incessant visual accounting of all those who had died, were about to die, or might as well die. The only thing missing was a bottle of scotch to numb the fear of a pending apocalypse, since liquor stores and pot shops remained open throughout the shutdown. Then in perfect synchronicity, the death-o-meters magically disappeared from the media like a canceled celebrity’s apology.
Unfortunately, human beings are complex; their mental health difficulties and drug addiction don’t respond as readily to a shift in the political agenda as quickly or easily as the news cycle demands. Sadly, it appears those who indulged in this sensationalism will not pay any price for the great harm they inflicted.
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Source:
https://amgreatness.com/2022/03/20/lockdown-mania-vs-the-people/
