Public: Drug Politics
Narcotics vending machine   (+5, -8)  [vote for, against]
Get pain killers when you need them

Every once in a while you need some heavy duty pain killing done that things like Advil just can't handle. The process of going to a doctor, then to a pharmacy, and then getting your pain killers is simply too long.

For instance let's say you have been drinking all weekend in Vegas and you bumped into some fists or walls or something and now you are at the airport on the way home. Wouldn't it be great to just put that $100 bill that you won into a machine that would pop out some Oxycontin or Percoset?

Granted this could lead to problems. But it also could be a good idea for drug dealers who normally have to actually go to their clients to sell their heroin or crack. Junkies can figure out that their credit isn't good when they get to the machine and don't have some hundred dollar bills to put in.

There is always the problem that you might get the wrong drug by pressing A6 instead of C6 but you have the same problem with candy bars.
-- dhousman, Oct 21 2004

Granted this could lead to problems.
I'm not sure which reason applies for [marked–for–deletion]--
I guess it would be advocacy, what it being illegal and all.
-- yabba do yabba dabba, Oct 21 2004


//but you have the same problem with candy bars.// Yes, but with different candy bars the effects are relatively the same (unless you wanted an Abba-Zabba but got a Nature Valley granola bar instead).
-- Machiavelli, Oct 21 2004


//Granted this could lead to problems./ / That's a slight understatement.

YDYD is correct, in it's current state this idea can't fly.
-- sartep, Oct 21 2004


//this idea can't fly// - nor can it walk, talk, or go rollerskating. But [dhousman], couldn't you just rename this idea "No Prescriptions For All" and be done with it?
-- vigilante, Oct 22 2004


//Get pain killers when you need them//

Just get a fake prescription and be like everyone else.
-- Pericles, Oct 24 2004


This idea would go great with the "What Happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas" marketing campaign I've seen on TV so much in the US.

Aside from that, that's the only thing it would go great with. With the rampant breakins of the machines so that dealers can sell 100$ drugs for 50$ I can't see this working well.
-- MrDaliLlama, Oct 25 2004


can't wait to see the packaging of each of the drugs
-- benfrost, Oct 25 2004


Smokable packaging...
-- EvilPickels, Oct 25 2004


The two times you be most likely to hit the wrong buttons are 1) When you really need some drugs, or 2) When you've had a lot of drugs. Still and all, I kind of like this.
-- wagster, Oct 25 2004


Something being illegal alone isn't grounds for deletion. I'm not sure that this is advocacy.

Whether or not access to drugs is controlled is really orthogonal to where you get the drugs. There's no reason why you shouldn't have a pharmacy automat. Prescriptions would have to be machine-readable, and would come as a little card not unlike what you get with some parking garages.

Might be fun to do this as an art project, too. What looks like a candy machine turns out to offer visitors a choice between prozac, viagra, and RU-486. (The prozac button would be slightly more worn than the others, from obsessive compulsives wiping it off, then pressing it, then pressing it again...)
-- jutta, Nov 03 2004


would have to be a huge vending machine, and also be able to dispense individual tablets, and liquids, rather than packs (as prescriptions often require different to pack quantities). It might be handy though as it might cut down on human error (in my experience it might do the reverse.. think of the number of times you've wanted diet coke and ended up with poxy fanta).
-- neilp, Nov 03 2004


It wouldn't have to be that large. It could just dispense sugar pills, colored and stamped on demand.
-- Worldgineer, Nov 03 2004



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