Narcotic abuse made easier by online pharmaceuticals
Prescription narcotic abuse is getting worse possibly because of the growing number of people with high speed internet access, states a new study. Researchers have suggested that more people were using online pharmacies to fill false prescriptions from 2000 to 2007, judging from increasing internet access and rates of treatment for prescription drugs addiction. That said, the people who conducted the study think it's merely a coincidence.
Rules on prescriptions not applied in offshore, online drug distributors
The LA Times reports that a connection between the growth of the internet usage and prescription drug abuse has been made in a study. The study is being published in Health Affairs, a non-partisan journal dedicated to medical policy problems. Researchers at the University of Southern California and Massachusetts General Hospital got together to do the research. The research looks at the number of individuals admitted to rehabilitation facilities due to addiction to prescription drugs and average internet usage. There was an increase in narcotic abuse with internet usage. They also went down together. Online pharmacy corporations located offshore are partially blamed, as they don't fall under U.S. jurisdiction and make it easier to get prescriptions for painkillers, sedatives, stimulants and anti-anxiety medications.
Higher speed leads to higher rates of abuse
There was another essential link in the study. It linked internet access speed to abuse frequency. A one percent increase in abuse admissions was recorded with every 10 percent increase in high-speed internet availability. This showed a clear connection, Reuters reported. That suggests that as the internet becomes easier to use at top speed, it becomes easier for addicts to get narcotics from unscrupulous online pharmacies. Oddly enough, admissions to the facilities in the research for illegal narcotics and alcohol decreased. According to the authors, it was just a coincidence. They recognize it is not a trigger and impact shown. Drug dealers sometimes purchase the narcotics, according to Time, in order to sell them. Less than one-tenth of 1 percent of prescription narcotic addicts said they really got their drugs online.
Those who die from prescription drugs
The CDC stated that as of 2007, deaths due to overdose of opioid painkillers for instance OxyContin were 1.93 times more common than fatalities from cocaine overdose, and 5.38 times more common than deaths from heroin overdose. The Narcotic Enforcement Agency states that there were millions that abused prescription narcotics in 2009. There were 7 million reported over the age of 12. The Obama administration recently proclaimed that it is seeking new prescription guidelines for opioid analgesics, according to the New York Times, in order to cut down on addictions and overdose. In the fiscal year 2012, the White House wants to spend $15.5 billion to enforce the law on illegal narcotic. There was a much lower spending budget in the 2010 fiscal. The Food and drug administration only got $3.2 billion. Legal narcotics cause more deaths.
Citations
Los Angeles Times
latimes.com/health/boostershots/la-heb-internet-drug-abuse-20110513,0,5119985.story
Reuters
reuters.com/article/2011/05/12/us-internet-drugabuse-idUSTRE74B6LP20110512?feedType=RSS&feedName=domesticNews
Time
healthland.time.com/2011/05/12/study-internet-access-may-increase-prescription-drug-misuse/
New York Times
nytimes.com/2011/04/20/health/20painkiller.html
Drug Enforcement Agency
justice.gov/dea/concern/prescription_drug_fact_sheet.html
Centers for Disease Control
cdc.gov/HomeandRecreationalSafety/Poisoning/brief_full_page.htm
Centers for Disease Control
cdc.gov/HomeandRecreationalSafety/Poisoning/data.html
White House Drug Enforcement Budget
whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/publications/policy/11budget/fy11Highlight.pdf
Food and Drug Administration
fda.gov/AboutFDA/ReportsManualsForms/Reports/BudgetReports/ucm153154.htm
Then Reuters is wrong.
Correlation does not equal causation, as any first year social science student would tell you.
ummmmm, think this OP is spam maysie....
No, the link leads to a (conservative-seeming) news site. I think the entire article is duplicated in the OP.
You sure about that, Maysie? The rise in OxyContin abuse means that rates of heroin addiction and deaths from heroin overdose are declining. Obviously, high speed internet access has a protective effect against heroin abuse
The DEA - taking real social problems and helping create disastrous social policy since 1973.
Oh I did not click on the link. Figured it was spam.
Here in London, it's only recently that pharmacies and walk-in clinics have developed stricter policies around the writing and filling of prescriptions for narcotics like oxycontin. I suspect that pharmacies, being more on the front lines of prescription drug development and use, were better and earlier informed as to its highly addictive properties, that it took considerably longer for those prescribing the drug to clue in.
Purdue Pharma, the manufacturers of OC, grossly underplayed the addictive nature of their drug when marketing it to the health care industry. As a result, it was over-prescribed - not just for immediate pain issues like dental pain, post-operative pain, etc., but also for chronic pain - resulting in not only an increase in dependency, but in more product to becoming available on the streets.
People with addiction issues are far more likely to abuse whatever drug is available, so if OC is more available than heroin, then OC it is. What I'd like to know is what the percentage of new dependency is in people who previously had no documented substance abuse issues. That, I think, is the most relevent figure in determining the damage highly addictive prescription drugs have done.
Something I'd also like to know - many people in addiction treatment tell me their doctor got them hooked.
I think that is happening with increased frequency, Sineed. I think one factor is that there is a lot more chronic pain due to waiting lists for certain surgeries, so doctors prescribe more. In addition, surgery patients are discharged fast these days, and sent home to manage pain unmonitored-- meaning a bunch of pain meds.
Until lately here in London, Doctors and Dentists were sending people home with some pretty gnarly drugs, and in large quantities. Now, I think becaue of increased scrutiny, there is closer control.
I criticize the London Free Press and Church Bulletin, and deservedly so, but their reporter Joe Belanger did a great investigative piece on Oxycontin addiction here in London, that pulled few punches. One of the big factors cited was the fact that most doctors education on these pain medications came from the drug companies that manufactured the drug.
What we need to do is create a firewall between Doctors and Pharmacuetical companies.
Very desirable--however governments are the agents of the pharmaceutical companies and their lobby, not "we".
We pay pharma's inflated drug prices and we pay politicians to be their shills and enforcers.
Little thought exercise: Let's say you woke up one day feeling rather out of sorts. Your skin doesn't feel right, you smell funny, and frankly, just... wrong. You go to your doctor, he says, "you're a perfectly healthy man/woman" which you say isn't right because you're a woman/man/otherwise gendered person. He clucks his tongue and, Germaine Greer reader that he is, tells you that gender is a social construct. You ask for hormone therapy, and he doesn't even make a pretense of considering it. There we are, the medical profession has just successfully protected 'you' (i.e. your assigned self) from yourself.
Tell me then how much an internet pharmacy that cost about 30% more than a domestic pharmacy would mean to you.
Your doctor reads Germaine Greer?
Her or J. Mike Bailey... either end of the spectrum (at least those from the 70's) seems to have the same amount of cold clinical hate of trans lesbians, but that's beside the point.
Some small consolation, having got about halfway through a Morgentaler bio... seems the Manitoba government was about as bad to cis women's medical needs in the early 80's as it is to trans women's medical needs now... gives me hope, I suppose... anyway, not to T-jack the thread, just wanted to make the point that 'mercenary medical providers' are often an important first step in asserting freedom in a field that's arbitrarily restricted.