to hope the Foreign Office don't waste any time on Laura Plummer...

[PiffleandWiffle]

She was stupid enough to smuggle drugs into a country against their laws, got caught & got sentenced.

BBC Link

Cue the predictable wailing & cries of "it's not fair" from the family!

Personally, I'd rather the Foreign Office spent it's time trying to help people who are genuinely in trouble abroad rather than idiots drug smugglers....

Even if you have a UK prescription for some drugs, you are still liable to be arrested and charged in some Middle Eastern countries for bringing them into the country.

I really want to get this point across as I am worried about the number of people who think that a UK issued prescription will negate a drug smuggling charge in places like the UAE.

It doesn't.

before I get accused of queue jumping for going private
If people accuse you of queue jumping by going private then they are forgetting that by you going private an NHS appointment is freed up more quickly for someone else.

I've been to various pain clinics between 2004 and 2012. Most were dire, some amazing - it's luck of the draw. Last one I went to apologised profusely and said there was nothing else they could offer and that was that. I gather there's no longer even a pain team in my CCG. If you happen to have pelvic pain, try and see the team at the Neurology Hospital in London, they were amazing.

I used to be on fentanyl patches which were fantastic at consistent pain relief, I imagine buprenorphine is similar. Pretty much zero chance of getting fentanyl these days though sadly.

Persian most likely, as they don't have the funding for ongoing management for anything that can be done in primary care

I've never had Butrans, although I have had (deep breath)

Pregabalin, gabapentin, amitrypitline, oxcarbazepine

Coproxamol, Codydramdol, dihydrocodeine, tramadol, sevredol (oral morphine), Oxycontin (modified release oxycodone), OxyNorm (instant release oxycodone) and fentanyl patches

I didn't get on with the fentanyl patches personally, as I developed a tolerance REALLY quickly. Continuous release meant there was no scope for me to take less on a good day, and my body developed tolerance very rapidly - so I was using my breakthrough meds just to get a baseline, within just a couple of months. However others have amazing results. So definitely worth giving it a try!

The only caveat with management in primary care is that IME GPs don't tend to understand the difference between tolerance, dependence and addiction

Every so often a GP will tell me they are addictive. Yes. I know. But as my pain consultant said to me when I was in his room crying after the top surgeon had said there was nothing we could do to fix my back, panicking that I was going to get addicted to the pain meds if I took them for the rest of my life - he said I'd been on strong opioids for 7 years at that point, and if I was going to get addicted, I'd have done so WAY before that time.

I have a significant tolerance. I have some degree of dependence. I am not addicted

@StatelessPrincess, would you be able to explain a bit more please about how married Egyptian men make money from these girlfriends?

StatelessPrincess, would you be able to explain a bit more please about how married Egyptian men make money from these girlfriends

Family member in hospital and needs an operation. It costs £xxx .

Can you bring Tramadol I am in do muc h pain.

Could you pay bill otherwise family will be homeless.

www.tripadvisor.co.uk/ShowTopic-g294200-i9124-k369292-Temporary_Marriages-Egypt.html

Foreign 'wives' can bring in expensive or banned items which can be sold on the black market and many give money to their 'husbands' when they spin sob stories about needing cash.

In various ways ohfortuna, the simplest one is just giving them sob stories about being skint and getting them to send it! A lot of the time they will say they can't talk to the woman as phone is rubbish, cant use skype, don't have credit etc so they get money for that, a man with several girlfriend's can massively boost his income just from that. The woman doesn't realise she's being used as it's not a large amount of money for her. Then they move on to bigger things, little sister needs school books, ill mum needs an operation, friend needs bail money, stuff like that. I know a man who owns a coffee shop, a new BMW and a beautiful apartment, all paid for by his wealthy British ''wife''. Another young man I know had a woman in her 70s give him 60k, he didn't even pretend to like her, she was obsessed with him. Younger, prettier women see those age gap relationships and think theirs is different, the only difference is the man does want to have sex with them, everything else is the same. Lots of these men are married, their wives know what's going on and accept it for the money.

Puzzledandpissedoff

I appreciate they're scampering along the margins of the surreal

what a polite way of putting it.

Every so often a GP will tell me they are addictive
Even though I already take 240mg of codeine a day, my GP said she couldn't do anymore as she didn't want me to have the "morphines" at such a young age as I would be on them forever.

I am 38 and broke my back 8 years ago, some days it is agony.

It literally is a case of painkillers all day every day or laying down all day.

I have no objection to having painkillers all day as they allow me to have a life.

It does make me mad that no-one has the same attitude about my ADHD meds which really are addictive as well.

Thank you for your advice about the pain clinics - bananafish81 and TammySwanson

if I was going to get addicted, I'd have done so WAY before that time
I would say that I am addicted to having a life like getting up and moving around and doing things.

I cannot do this without the medications so am I addicted to the medications or having a life??

She isnt a dealer. Its a victimless crime

It is.

And even if it wasn't she is still supplying illegal drugs.

I have seen it many timed too Stateless.
There are villages I know of that are built almost entirely from money these love rats have scammed. Their local wife's are often fully aware of their husbands carrying on and often encourage it as it keeps them in a comfortable lifestyle.

I know places like that too pinkmagic1 it's crazy. And most of these women know what goes on but they seem to convince themselves that their man is different. Especially when they've met his family. And I'm thinking of course his parents were nice to you, you're their pension!

I wonder if those imagining conversations where Omar's claimed "I'm in awwwful pain" have remembered that he's supposed to be a hotel activities organiser?

Is it really likely he'd be able to carry out such a role - a role which Laura will certainly have seen him in - if this was true? And might it not have put a crimp on her sex life with him, which she was so keen to sign a so-called "marriage" document in order to enjoy?

As PPs have said, they really must think everyone else is stupid ...

Persian your GP is clueless. Your body converts codeine into morphine! And high doses of codeine all day every day is a sure fire way to end up with a bowel obstruction (been there!). Hope you can find someone who can help.

I lived in Egypt for several years and I saw so many British women have terrible relationships with Egyptian men. I was an expat teacher on a good salary by Egyptian standards and quite a few of my colleagues got involved with guys who were just after their money. Some men fancy a British passport and some are just after sex. There were a few occasions when middle aged women turned up at our school looking for TA jobs having jacked it all in in the U.K. to hook up with some tour guide or waiter. I remember one lady had grandkids and I really wanted to tell her go home. Why give it up for some guy who will expect you to be the breadwinner but do everything on his terms? My own dh is Egyptian and literally we were the only successful and happy couple I knew. I don't want to sound smug,I'm just trying to illustrate how many British women I saw in unhappy relationships. Even my dh doesn't understand what it is about British women that they fall for these losers.

Miss Eliza, this is where you have to also tell us that your husband isn’t a waiter/holiday rep and that he definitely doesn’t have a wife and children back in his Home village 😬

Actually, I’m just wondering now how many women around the world thought ‘bollocks’ when they saw their ‘husband’ Omar the great staring back at them from the newspaper😬

It is NOT a victimless crime, NOTHING criminal involving abused drugs is, she may have only been convicted of possession because she wasn't caught selling/giving them to anyone else but I have no doubt they were going to be sold to ADDICTS they would have been and possibly have been victims of her actions in the past. PLUS as has been mentioned it also includes quite possibly defrauding the nhs.

Senorita if all that were true then why did she try to hide them? Why not just declare them at customs? No way not buying that at all.

"olivers loads of drugs that are available to us in the UK/Europe, are not available in other parts of the world" except THIS drug is a CONTROLLED drug even here in the uk, she knew it wasn't an otc medication.

Also given her age she WILL have seen at least one of the many adverts made by the govt advising not to transport items for others in travel to other countries. There's plenty online and there have been several tv shows and news articles on others who have ended up in prison abroad for doing exactly this kind of thing.

And you know what even IF by some weird stretch she hadn't, ignorance is no defence - even in uk law!

Lostwithinthehills is spot on, sooooo innocent and naive yet acquired 300 tablets of a CONTROLLED drug - nah it's bullshit.

Hmmm ha ha! I never thought about that! He's very welcome to have a second wife if he wants! Good luck to her!
Seriously it does make me sad when I see women give it all up for someone who sees them as a meal ticket. At least LP wasn't living in Egypt. Life is very hard there unless you're loaded.

I do feel quite sorry for her actually.

This might be a bit rude to say but I thought she came across as not very bright

It seems like she thought of it was being the same thing as taking the odd line of coke, which technically is illegal, but people do flout laws if they think they'll get away with it.

Deed is done, sentence is served, hope UK will prosecute the supplier in the UK as it's not OK to supply a large volume at the expense of the NHS

I see they've been messing her dm around regarding which prison she's been put in. Poor woman. Incidentally what happened to the lovely Omar?

I do have some sympathy for her. Yes she was stupid and yes she broke the law, but she is now spending up to three years in a "hell hole" foreign prison. I would have sympathy for anyone in that scenario, especially when convicted of a non-violent crime. And yes that includes the Egyptian women in the same prison (although at least they don't have the language barrier, and their local family will be more able to visit).

She might not be very bright but she managed to source a large quantity of medication without getting it prescribed for her.

I'm not sure I'd know how to do that.

Our local news is covering her story a lot on social media as her home is in our region, and the comments calling her a naive young girl are annoying me.

She may be naive, but 33 is not that young. One person in particular is commenting a lot to say that she hasn't had the benefit of further education and is very young.

I'm not sure if they're implying her mental capacity is limited and childlike or not, but surely if that's the case it would have been mentioned as her defence and her parents wouldn't allow her to fly off to Egypt and marry some random man if her mental capacity wasn't that of an adult.

Her sentence could have been much worse, and I think it's appropriate. She was a frequent visitor to the country and she broke their law and ours. If they had let her off with a slap on the wrist she could have been back with another suitcase full on the next flight.

I don't like that she's going to be ill and badly treated in prison, and I feel sorry for her and her family. But the length of her sentence seems appropriate to me for the crime she has committed.

I can't remember which PP mentioned that we wouldn't tell someone not be be homosexual in Egypt but I would say it's far easier to not smuggle drugs than it is to stop being gay.

It's inhumane to persecute someone for being homosexual, and I do think it's right to speak out against the way other countries and our own treat people who are gay. We know that being gay is not a crime or a choice. Smuggling drugs is both. We can't reasonably compare them when it comes to speaking up.