Demerol+Anorexia+Dehydration=Death

Perhaps you saw how as the attendants moved Michael Jackson, his body lay nearly flat on the stretcher, as though there were an ironing board underneath the sheet, rather than the body of a full person.

My guess from just a glance, is that he weighed around 100 pounds or less. Not slender, not thin, rather… entirely skeletal.

Most people are familiar with anorexia nervosa, an emotional disorder characterized by an obsessive, sometimes nearly psychotic longing to lose weight. This condition is accompanied by what is called dysmorphia, meaning there is a disconnect with reality about what a person’s body actually looks like.

No matter how thin, how sharp the shoulderblades become, even in women the cessation of menstruation, in men the loss of libido, does not cause the sufferer to realize they are in a life-threateningly crisis–not just underweight– but in the exact starvation mode that occurs naturally in persons who are dying;

In an actual end of life process, the person with a terminal illness most often begins to refuse food, then water… this signals the kidneys and other absolutely essential parts of the body to close down, with eventual cessation of the heartbeat.

However, there is another kind of anorexia in addition to an emotional disorder and a natural process of dying… and it is a side effect of opiate and opiate like medications that cause a loss of appetite in some. The person in this situation, too, has to ‘remember’ or be reminded to eat… they do not feel as you and I do, hunger in a regular pattern… and oftimes, not thirst either.

One hazard of Demerol (developed in the 1930s) is dependency, meaning greater and greater tolerance to the drug, thereby seemingly needing higher and higher doses in order to mediate whatever kind of pain the person is trying to palliate.

The major hazard of Demerol is that, like other opiates, it cannot be given without higher than usual risk to persons who are debilitated… and when given by injection, needs to be administered into a large muscle.

Looking at Jackson’s seeming emaciated body on the stretcher would make one wonder where there was a large muscle left to him.

In some patients who have poor circulatory systems, thin or deeply hidden veins, or veins that have collapsed from previous injections, great care has to be taken about ‘where’ to inject that will not harm the major systems of the body…

Often a venous site can be found between toes, in lower leg, or sometimes under the tongue. If an I.V. porting system is brought into play, it is not a casual intervention. Great care is required to flush properly so air is not introduced into the body. There ought be a gate that inhibits blocking of the tubing, and rigorous hygiene of the exit site so infection is not introduced to body cavity and thereby to the major organs, including a heart infection.

In debilitated, run-down persons who are not decently nourished or hydrated, Demerol can cause sudden convulsion, respiratory depression–meaning the person cannot get enough oxygen quickly enough to avoid going into further respiratory distress. Respiratory arrest (breathing stops altogether), shock, and cardiac arrest can follow.

Dehydration from just normal night perspiration in a person who is frail, or from vigorous workouts in a person who is underweight, without being replenished in a timely way with adequate water… causes loss of critical electrolytes in the body, amongst other ill effects… ending in heart arrhythmia.

In those undernourished or ill, loss of electrolytes –minute amounts of ionized/ ionizable constituents of a living cell/blood that help to regulate body systems, (such as potassium, for instance) can weaken the body systems and cause the heart to stop entirely.

Opiate dependency and/or wrongfully administered opiate-like drug
+Extremely run-down health
+Underweight
+Dehydration
+Unqualified or careless physician oversight
+No intervention by those close in

=Deadly Outcome