To the editor:

In Mr. O’Leary’s letter about following medical advice, he used the opioid epidemic as an example of the failure of the medical community to be credible. According to him they “created and encouraged the flood of opioids into communities.”

True, science created medications to ease pain and help our bodies cope with a variety of surgeries and damages. I would hate to have gone through any procedures I faced without the created drugs and scientific knowledge. But the medical community only develops these things and implements use under either government or corporate directions.

The opioid crisis has been determined to be the responsibility of the corporate, not medical community. This is reflected in over 900 government cases against wholesale distributors and manufacturers of opioids in order to recover the immense damages sustained as a result of these companies creating the current opioid epidemic.

The lawsuits also claim the pharmaceutical companies lobbied politicians and doctors in an effort to artificially increase the use of opioids and willfully allowed the drugs to enter the black market. The courts overwhelmingly placed the blame on corporations and billions of dollars were collected.

Also, Purdue Pharma will admit to enabling the supply of drugs “without legitimate medical purpose.”

Mr. O’Leary seems to confuse the medical community with the corporate one. I’m sure there are some in the medical field influenced by money and act selfishly. Much like our for profit prison system, we find judges and perhaps prosecutors violating individual rights to help keep the beds full, and prison companies profitable.

Of course, financial benefits go in their direction. In both healthcare and prison, the profit motive corrupts. For profit has its place, but not in essential uncompromising services like healthcare and prisons. One approach is for the good of profit, the other for the good of the public. The goals need to match the desired outcomes.

His praise of the Baraga Manifesto falls pretty shallow to me. Counties who desire independence fail to take the responsibility that goes with it. Concerning a reckless approach to virus guidelines, who do they think will pay for the uninsured, increased hospital costs and long term disabilities?

I am certain Baraga County does not care to assume that cost. Many of the taxpayers who will, are not county residents. Now they have created another violation of someone’s rights. That “taxation without representation” thing.