An investigation by The Associated Press has found that at least 17 people died in Florida over a decade following physical encounters with police during which medical personnel also injected them with a powerful sedative.
Cops (and paramedics) should not have access to Ketamine. The last thing you want in a k hole is to be man handled. That shit will scar you for life if it doesn't kill you.
No reason to use ketamine unless you are in the process of intubating them or they have woken up during surgery. Putting someone on a breathing machine happens in a hospital environment not on a sidewalk done by an EMT. Ketamine at high doses is a powerful dissociative (forces mind to switch to 3rd person view) used by anesthesiologists when someone becomes conscious during traumatic procedures. Like when someone wakes up while surgeons have their chest opened up or they need to be woken while intubated on a breathing machine. Causes what would be an extremely traumatic experience to become an out of body experience that a person will likely dismiss should they even remember it.
Interesting, I've always been of the belief that K doesn't have a ton of "real world" use cases beyond being a bit of fun. (Its therapeutic potential is likely done better by other substances subjectively) Never heard of it being used as a backup anesthesic.
I'm an emt. If you seen how some people are behaving before getting ketimine, you wouldn't be saying this. 17 people in 10 years died in Florida? There would definitely have been more than 17 who died if they didn't get drugged. You can all sit there in your armchairs and make all the claims you want, but you haven't actually been there and seen how unhumanly strong some people will get when they're flipping out and their heart rate is 180 and they don't care about hurting themselves or others.
I'm sure it's been misused tons of times just like almost anything else, but making a statement that medics shouldn't have it to administer is pure ignorance spoken by people who don't have to deal with those situations.