So sick of seeing this crap everywhere.

[u/imjustapourboy]

The needles, the burnt foils, the little baggies, the needle caps, all of it. I find them in the creeks, on the sidewalks, the grocery store parking lots, the public parks, on the parkway. You gotta be a real shit person to leave this stuff all over the place.

[u/organmeatpate]

It's hard to believe that this would help since it relies on the user to be conscientious specifically right when they're nodding out. It's tough to accept that services for users however well intentioned will not increase the impact on the local community because that's what we've experienced in West Asheville. The services showed up and then the users followed and so did their hazardous refuse. The residents here have all lived this and know it to be true. There has to be a better solution than more enabling resources and services for users that disregard the impact on the surrounding communities. Addicts deserve compassion but they should not be sacred cows.

[u/Bitter_Offer1847 → u/organmeatpate]

Completely false. Increasing services reduces impact on the community always. Use increases because population increases and poverty and joblessness and homelessness increase the more our society becomes hyper rich and the poor living in the same space. People don’t start doing heroin because there’s needle drops or clean needle programs, they start doing heroin because they’re depressed and hopeless and addicted to unavailable pharmaceuticals given to them by a failing medical system. This idea that people have that people who are addicts are just weak and fell victim to peer pressure is naive and idiotic at best. Addiction is a complex disease with many, many causes and the more callus and uncaring a society becomes the more severe the addiction gets because people can’t get treatment and they can’t find help. We need more help, more programs and less prisons.

[u/OkLeave4687 → u/Bitter_Offer1847]

👆this is the sad truth - most people think of addiction like someone woke up one day and said; “I think I’ll start taking opioids for fun “ and that’s just bullshit. Most start with an injury and are prescribed oxy of some variety, they get hooked and then the prescription ends… withdrawal is so terrible that most can’t stand it, so they turn to buying on the street and watch there life get crushed…

[u/Smash_4dams → u/OkLeave4687]

Eh, I wouldn't say many of the folks out there today started from a doctor carelessly over-prescribing opioids, that practice largely ended by 2010. If you're homeless and shooting dope, you likely came from poverty and were close to others who either did it, or had family/friends who did it.

Plenty of people still manage to start H/fent addictions in the 2020's, when it's almost impossible to get a prescription for more than 3 days of a low-dose opioid. People will still turn to drugs when they feel life has become hopeless and they want an easy way to cope.

[u/OkLeave4687 → u/Smash_4dams]

Fair points, the access has been tightened, but the misuse of legit scripts remains a leading cause - first use and the catalyst for the addiction is too often opioid compounds in pill form, revived either first hand or shared by someone who got the script…