California gets shipment of drug for executions, $36K for one pound

[Liberal_in_LA]

California gets shipment of drug for executions

While many states are running short of a drug necessary to carry out executions, California just received a major shipment.

California prison officials said Friday they received 514.5 grams, or a little more than a pound, of sodium thiopental, the first of three drugs administered during a lethal injection to knock out an inmate.

The state was forced to call off its first execution in more than five years in September in part because its entire stock of the drug had expired.

The state paid $36,415 to an overseas company to purchase the drug made by Archimedes Pharma of Great Britain after the sole U.S. manufacturer stopped delivering sodium thiopental.

On Friday, Hospira Inc. of Lake Forest, Ill. said it was halting production of the sodium thiopental, further exacerbating the drug shortage in the United States.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/01/21/state/n181724S48.DTL#ixzz1BjDRSY6R

[somone]

1. So how many people can they kill with that?

[lonestarnot]

2. Death penaltyers will be getting out there rocks to pile up.

[customerserviceguy]

3. Is sodium pentothiol absolutely irreplaceable?

According to my research, its clinical uses have been essentially replaced by propofol. All it would take is a state to amend its laws to permit a substitute.

In any case, the effect of both drugs is anesthesia, who cares which drug is used?