Reflections | Like fentanyl addicts in San Francisco, ancient Chinese had their drug of choice – 5-rock powder
- Synthetic opioid fentanyl destroys lives in today’s America. In ancient China people ground up five minerals to create a drug that produced feelings of euphoria
- Five-rock powder also lightened complexions, but left some withered; had other ill-effects; and caused users to plunge into icy baths. Slowly its use died out
Late one night, at a streetcar stop in San Francisco, a dishevelled man, thin as a rake, approached us and asked if we could give him some money to buy dinner. He was very young, but bent forward, his back almost perpendicular with his lower body – probably a habitual user of fentanyl, the drug that’s been destroying so many lives in San Francisco.
The online videos are real. In the city’s downtown, we saw scores of addicts roaming the streets at all hours of the day, some petrified, literally, by the effects of “tranq dope”, a combination of fentanyl and animal tranquilliser.
Like most people in San Francisco and other big cities, we instinctively ignored the young man, inwardly justifying our indifference with vague rationalisations of not wanting to be enablers of substance abuse or street begging.
But these excuses we told ourselves quickly gave way to the heartbreaking reality right in front of us: a cold, desperately hungry man was asking us for help. We went into a nearby gas station and bought him some sandwiches.
