Death row inmate received lethal injection of animal drug!

[All4MyDaughter]

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This has been all over the news today? Is it me, or is this much ado about nothing?

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/12/16/oklahoma.execution/index.html?hpt=T1

So there's a shortage of sodium thiopental. Is pentobarbital really an unacceptable choice? It's not just an "animal drug." It's approved for use in humans. Is this just an issue of the media making a big deal over something insignificant?

Disclaimer: I'm opposed to the death penalty. But it's legal and executions happen. I'm not sure the choice of barbiturate makes a huge difference. Does it?

 

[WVUPharm2007]

Same pharmacology...hell, damn near the same molecule...yup, just the media not knowing what the hell they are talking about.

 

[Its Z]

Much better option than electric chair, gas chamber, hanging, public stoning, or firing line.

 

[npage148]

the real kicker is the brand name is Fatal-Plus.

 

[All4MyDaughter]

Same pharmacology...hell, damn near the same molecule...yup, just the media not knowing what the hell they are talking about.

With an assist from his attorneys who are arguing that pentobarbital is an ANIMAL drug (ZOMG!) and it's "cruel and unusual" to use it in humans. I saw some sort of "Medical Expert" on the news today say (with a straight face) "We just don't know the consequences of giving this drug to a human being." ORLY? LOL

 

[PharmTheQuah]

This shouldn't even be an issue. We Oklahomans should be mad they aren't using shoe strings to do it!

 

[PharmDstudent]

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/12/1...g-for-animal-euthanasia-due-to-drug-shortage/

 

[SomeGuy]

I find it sadder how far some states went to get sodium thiopental specially imported from the UK for capital punishment, but there seems to be little such effort towards such importations for, ya know, medicine.

Great priorities there.

 

[pharm B]

Threads merged.

 

[psychoandy]

clearly the department of prisons needs a residency trained pharmacist to help guide drug therapy options and monitoring therapeutic/toxic endpoints.

i vote much ado about nothing, and reporters having a slow news day

 

[PharmDstudent]

clearly the department of prisons needs a residency trained pharmacist to help guide drug therapy options and monitoring therapeutic/toxic endpoints

🙄 Yeah... a residency would totally make a difference... not!

 

[rxlea]

🙄 Yeah... a residency would totally make a difference... not!

I sense sarcasm in psychoandy's post... Maybe I was wrong?

 

[Sine Cura]

So what accounts for thiopental's much shorter duration of action (thiopental being more lipophilic with the sulfur substitution)?

 

[Pharmavixen]

clearly the department of prisons needs a residency trained pharmacist to help guide drug therapy options and monitoring therapeutic/toxic endpoints.

😀 I wonder if they swabbed his arm with alcohol before inserting the IV.

Though when I 1st started working in the jail, I did some reading about pharmacists employed in the correctional system. Some of the references brought up the issue of whether the pharmacist should get involved in preparing the doses for the lethal injections.

SDNers: would you do it?

 

[All4MyDaughter]

😀 I wonder if they swabbed his arm with alcohol before inserting the IV.

Though when I 1st started working in the jail, I did some reading about pharmacists employed in the correctional system. Some of the references brought up the issue of whether the pharmacist should get involved in preparing the doses for the lethal injections.

SDNers: would you do it?

No, but I wouldn't even apply for a job that required me to participate in executions.

 

[Ackj]

A few classmates of mine have a running joke that Pentobarb is a wonder drug cure all ever since we learned about using it for burst suppression in refractory status epilepticus. Refractory htn? Fixes that. Insomnia, check. Mania, anxiety, pain, parkinsonism, etc. A little primitive, a lot dangerous, but in theory it's a great drug.

Honestly, people are lucky we don't skip the first two and go straight to the KCl. Or use a guillotine. So much bureaucracy nowadays, the guy was in for rape and shooting in 1978, and he killed his inmate in 2001 (with shoelaces!), and now just yesterday he crossed the river.

 

[BavarianMWE46]

Lead is cheap and effective, should use that.

 

[Quiksilver]

Lets not forget that they use 2 other drugs to get the job done. I'm sure that it works well enough to knock him out and cause enough respiratory depression in combination withe the vecuronium.

 

[Its Z]

SDNers: would you do it?

no.

 

[FarscapeGirl]

😀 I wonder if they swabbed his arm with alcohol before inserting the IV.

Though when I 1st started working in the jail, I did some reading about pharmacists employed in the correctional system. Some of the references brought up the issue of whether the pharmacist should get involved in preparing the doses for the lethal injections.

SDNers: would you do it?

Nope. I have a huge problem with the death penalty, the way we lock up people with mental illness, the way we lock up people for non-violent crimes, the way we treat a lot of people once they're in prison, the fact the justice system is far from just...

Not that some people, the violent and dangerous ones, don't deserve to be locked away from society (although I wish we'd also lock up the white collar criminals that screw over thousands of people). I just think others should be forced to work off the payment for their property damage or sent to treatment or something besides being put in jail.

I think I just ruled out ever being a pharmacist at a prison...

 

[Keyoda]

Colbert said that the prison was offered a lone of thiopental from another out of state prison to which the warden replied by email "thanks, you guys are life savers"

 

[loveoforganic]

Colbert said that the prison was offered a lone of thiopental from another out of state prison to which the warden replied by email "thanks, you guys are life savers"