First Nations Voice

January 2013

Building bridges between all communities

Issue link: http://publications.winnipegfreepress.com/i/100814

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JANUARY 2013 GENERIC OXYCONTIN WILL COMPOUND ADDICTION PROBLEMS An Anishinabek Nation Regional Chief says the federal government should be blocking the creation of a cheaper generic version of OxyContin, a highly-addictive pain medication. ���Our people, communities and families are being destroyed by this drug,��� says Northern Superior Regional Grand Chief Peter Collins. ���The Government of Canada has a moral and fiduciary responsibility to not allow pharmaceutical companies to create more and cheaper alternatives.��� With the patent about to end on the prescription drug OxyContin,Federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq had the opportunity to stop drug companies from developing a generic version of the highly- addictive drug. She says Ottawa will not intervene. ���The federal government had an opportunity to stop the production of a generic drug that has been proven to be dangerous and destructive,��� says Chief Collins of Fort William First Nation. ���That action must be taken.��� OxyContin, while a highly-effective option for treating severe pain, is an opiate-based drug that has proven to be a significant problem in addiction and related criminal activity. The ease with which it can be tampered with to create a herointype high and its overprescription have created a plague of OxyContin addiction across the United States and Canada, especially in First Nations. First Nations have been vocal about the need for the federal government to work with them in battling the war on drugs, and cautiously applauded the March announcement by Health Canada that OxyContin sales were being halted. First Nations leaders asked for assistance in coping with the effects of withdrawal experienced by people living with addictions. ���Fighting the use of OxyContin is still an issue,��� says Chief Collins. ���Supplies are dwindling, but those with access or supply to the drug are still making it available. Introduction to the market of generic versions will only add to the problem. The Anishinabek Nation established the Union of Ontario Indians as its secretariat in 1949. The UOI is a political advocate for 39 member communities across Ontario, representing approximately 55,000 people. The Union of Ontario Indians is the oldest political organization in Ontario and can trace its roots back to the Confederacy of Three Fires, which existed long before European contact. - Marci Becking, Communications Officer THE MAYAN APOCALYPSE By Drew Hayden Taylor To quote the musical group REM, ���It���s the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine).��� And I actually do feel fine. As I am sure you���ve heard, according to doomsday enthusiasts, the end of all we know is fast approaching. On December 21st, 2012, civilization, reality, the world, mortgage payments, Christmas specials, all come to an end due to some apocalyptic sneeze that nobody seems to know much about. I am sure you���ve heard about it. It���s been in all the papers. They even made a movie about it starring John Cusack. And as is usually the case, Native people have been given the blame, this time for the end of existence. See what happens when you take too long settling land claims! According to rumour, the Mayan cyclical calendar, known as they b���ak���tun, officially ends this winter���s solstice. That���s certainly one excessive way to avoid Christmas shopping. Two thousand years ago, the Mayans created a number of highly sophisticated citystates through out central America, where they had the time and intelligence to make brilliant astronomical observations and calculated amazingly accurate mathematics and calendars. There���s even evidence that they even created the concept of the zero all by themselves which to me and you might not seem all that amazing but supposedly to scientists, that���s something pretty remarkable. So they bring some pretty impressive credentials to the art of calendar making. Current theories as to how this approaching apocalypse will happen include a runaway planet suddenly smashing into the Earth. Unlikely, as it would have been spotted years ago as it approached. Then there���s the sun developing massive solar storms toasting us in our orbit. One NASA scientist responding to doomsday questions says this is highly unlikely, that the sun is acting quite ���wimpy��� at present. Other notions include the Earth���s magnetic poles might reverse or the world will somehow travel almost 30,000 light years and fall into a black hole at the centre of the galaxy. Those darn Mayans. I wonder if Michael Stipes and the rest of the REM group were Mayan!? I must check Wikipedia. The problem is, Mayan and non-Mayan scholars are telling people, as the End of Days rapidly approach, to essentially ���forgetaboutit���. Guatemala and the Yucatan are not full of Mayans digging survival bunkers or bomb shelters in the jungle. The expiry dates on their milk go way past December 21st. Remember how your mother always told you to wear clean underwear in case you get in an accident? Well, on December 21st, feel free to wear your dirtiest pair cause not much is going to happen on a planetary level. It���s much ado about nothing. They say the best way to understand this non-issue is to look at the calendar you currently have hanging on your wall or the daytimer on your desk, with your dentists appointment listed and the birthdays of your kids circled in red. Those calendars, called the Gregorian calendar, basically end on December 31st (unless you���ve got one of those 16 month calendars, then never mind). So following the logic in this case, does this sudden lack of numbered days indicate the world will end on New Year���s eve?!!? No, you are saying while rolling your eyes, it just means it���s time to get a new calendar. That is essentially the same concept as what is happening with the Mayan calendar. All calendars are cycles and all cycles end, until a new one is started up. The Mayans never got around to developing that new calendar, what with the collapse of their civilization and all. Even though they were brilliant with calculations, they never anticipated the silliness that would happen centuries in the future when people with entirely too much time on their hands would notice the Mayan calendar was running out. How rude of the Mayans. I guess the Mayans aren���t totally to blame. If anybody���s curious, the Ojibway have their own theories about when the end of the world will happen. There���s a short story called ���The Nine Billion Names of God��� that theorizes that the only reason we are put on this earth is to list all the names created to express God. And, in the story, when this super computer has accomplished this, in the sky, one by one, each of the stars started to disappear. The Ojibway believe something similar. When the last land claim is settled and signed, one by one, each of the government officials, each of the lawyers, each of the Chiefs, will one by one disappear (or become a civil servant). But if the Armageddon does happen, the only truly annoying thing will be: the end of the world will happen just before the beginning of a long weekend.

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