Drug makers rake in profits while opioid crisis worsens
Thousands have died and thousands more lives have been destroyed due to the over-prescribing and abuse of opioids.
Last year in Canada, 2,458 deaths were attributed to opioid overdose — a number that’s trending higher this year.
The Star’s series on the subject did a good job of bringing attention to what has been called a “public health care crisis” in Canada by a spokesperson for federal Health Minister Jane Philpott.
Aside from the Star series, there was a story in the National Post section of the Star on June 1, about a short research letter that appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1980 and how that letter may have impacted the explosion of opioid use in North America.
The finding of that letter was that patients hardly ever become addicted to narcotic painkillers.
This letter has been cited more than 600 times. The citations peaked the late 1990s and early 2000s with the introduction of the drug OxyContin.
Apparently, many specialists promoted the idea that narcotic painkillers were a safe option for people with chronic pain. They were relying on this 1980 research letter as evidence supporting this notion.
However, the research letter looked at a small number of hospital patients who had been treated with narcotic painkillers while in hospital.
That’s a far cry from long-term use for chronic pain.
The manufacturers of these narcotics continue to manufacture, distribute and make billions in profits and we are left with a public health care crisis.
Where does the insanity end? Ken Brown, Windsor