Who knew that taking a random picture of a sign that said:
“ Why is Narcan free to a dope addict but my insulin is $750 a month?”
while on my morning drive would turn into years of debates online. But, that is exactly what happened in 2017 when I snapped this picture of a sign which has now gone viral online with almost a half a million shares on Facebook:
The Sign
The photo has now been edited, shared, and made into articles. I have received nasty grams (people feeling this is disrespectful to drug addicts), thank yous and people even offering me their insulin. (Even though I am not diabetic myself, I thank you for the kind offers.)
Let me get a few things straight. This is not a meme. This was a very real picture of a sign that I took in North Ridgeville, Ohio at Northridge Auto Repair shop. The owner of the auto shop, Jay Linn, has passed away since this photo was taken in 2017.
The Diabetic
Why did I post a picture of this sign to Facebook? It is a good debate to have.
Drug prices have gone through the roof in recent years, and as insulin has tripled in price we still see many people struggling to get their medication. While I’m not diabetic, I have had issues myself over the years just getting my Epi-Pen refilled because as Jonathan Newman points out:
Mylan has been repeatedly protected from competition, and it has repeatedly (and predictably) increased the price of EpiPens in response.
Government regulations have killed the free market in healthcare, and as a result, people are dying — they are responsible for killing people. As Timothy D. Terrell once said,
The FDA itself injects a politicized uncertainty into the drug research, production, and marketing process, and therefore drives up costs. These costs can appear as death and suffering as well as dollars.
What is needed is a free market approach. As a recent Fee article pointed out:
“ In a free market, competition is the best way for improvements in the levels of quality and service that a consumer receives in their products.”
The Drug Addict
If there is one thing that has destroyed lives more than anything it has been the War on Drugs, both directly and as an indirect result of all the further destructive government encroachments it opens the door for. As Ludwig von Mises once pointed out,
“Once the principle is admitted that it is the duty of government to protect the individual against his own foolishness, no serious objections can be advanced against further encroachments.”
The government has a long history of saving you from yourself, from the prohibition on alcohol, or the raiding of a cancer patients marijuana, to more recently a tea known as kratom. The list of what the government won’t allow you to put in your body is long.
As Mark Thornton wrote, prohibition doesn’t work,
“The Gateway Theory of drugs has been thoroughly discredited, but the history of the War on Drugs has mimicked the theory because over time law enforcement effort and legal penalties have increased and consequently drugs have become more potent and dangerous to consume. The War on Drugs has also spread crime, corruption, and violence. The US has the world’s largest prisoner population and highest rate of incarceration. The most salient factor in this is the War on Drugs. America is also home to the largest gang population in the world, largely financed by selling illegal drugs. Our War on Drugs has caused failed states in Central America and is a leading vehicle for financing terrorism.”
Whatever happened to the freedom to make mistakes? As Ludwig von Mises once said,
Freedom really means the freedom to make mistakes. This we have to realize. We may be highly critical with regard to the way in which our fellow citizens are spending their money and living their lives. We may believe that what they are doing is absolutely foolish and bad, but in a free society, there are many ways for people to air their opinions on how their fellow citizens should change their ways of life. They can write books; they can write articles; they can make speeches; they can even preach at street comers if they want — and they do this in many countries. But they must not try to police other people in order to prevent them from doing certain things simply because they themselves do not want these other people to have the freedom to do it.
In Conclusion
Jay Linn, the man who put up the sign that I took a picture of, might not have lived long enough to know how many people would end up talking about his sign. But he did leave us with a gift. To question the narrative the media and government feed us daily. He got us talking. Personally, I don’t believe the drug addict nor the diabetic are to blame… the drug manufactures and government regulations are. We need a free market in healthcare and we need to end the drug war that has failed so many. It is long past time to take our lives and bodies back from these government tyrants and start making choices for ourselves. Our lives and the lives of millions depend on it.
