Pharmageddon: Prescription drugs are killing America's youth. (NaturalNews) No parent wants to lose a child, but when one dies from something that should be very preventable, the heartbreak and tragedy is compounded.
Such is increasingly the case with prescription drugs - they're killing our youth. Sarah Shay and Savannah Kissick, of Morehead, Ky., best friends since high school, were both victims of what experts and the White House are describing as an epidemic of prescription drug deaths. Sarah died in 2006 at the tender age of 19; Savannah just three years later, at 22. Prescription drugs responsible for more deaths than traffic accidents, study finds. (NaturalNews) Every 14 minutes, a person is killed by prescription drugs -- and unlike most other causes of preventable death, which have been on the decline for years, medication-induced deaths are on the upswing across the US.
According to a recent analysis conducted by the Los Angeles Times (LA Times), drug-induced deaths have become so prevalent that their average yearly total now exceeds the number of deaths caused by traffic accidents. It is truly a sad day in the world when the very medications prescribed for treating disease are one of the leading causes of death, including among young children. And based on data retrieved by the LA Times, the number of drug fatalities has doubled within the past ten years, as legal drugs now kill nearly 38,000 Americans every single year -- and these are just the deaths about which we know. Sources for this story include: SPECIAL REPORT: Sarnia awash in painkillers; one woman’s struggle with addiction - The Sarnia Observer - Ontario, CA.
Editor's note: This is the first in a three-part weekly series about opiate use in Sarnia-Lambton.
At first, they were just a handful of pills in a small plastic bottle stuffed away in her mother's medicine cabinet. Then, they were the answer to Nancy Roy's migraines. They'd been coming on in waves and she was looking for relief. The 10 Most Dangerous Meds Driving America's Pill Crisis. December 26, 2011 | Like this article? Join our email list: Stay up to date with the latest headlines via email. Want to get the latest on America's drug & rehab culture? Daily Exchange. ____________________ Drug Use Many drug control initiatives to date based on insufficient evidence, but emerging evidence-based interventions could reduce drug-related harms New York - The pursuit of public good is an appropriate objective of drug policy, and necessitates the judicious application of controls over availability, prevention, treatments and rehabilitation.
Public good may be achieved by increasing the number of people who are completely abstinent and also through reduced levels of use or changed patterns of use by those who continue to use. Policy makers have pursued many drug control initiatives that lack scientific evidence for their effectiveness, and that can cause harm through unintended consequences. But evidence-based interventions are emerging that can make drugs less available, reduce violence in drug markets, lessen misuse of legal (pharmaceutical) drugs, prevent initiation in young people, and reduce drug use and its consequences among existing users.
HOOKED, PART 3: Sarnia's battle with a prescription painkiller epidemic - The Sarnia Observer - Ontario, CA. Are Pill Mill Pharmacies replacing Family Pharmacies throughout the country? Abuse of prescribed medicines takes deadly toll. The 230-pound Castle Hayne man, who had a tattoo of Johnny Cash on his shoulder, was dead.
Alcohol and seven prescription drugs, including anxiety medication for which he had a prescription, were in his system, according to an autopsy report. Patient advocacy group funded by success of painkiller drugs, probe finds. But the pills continue to have an influential champion in the American Pain Foundation, which describes itself as the nation’s largest advocacy group for pain patients.
Its message: The risk of addiction is overblown, and the drugs are underused. What the nonprofit organization doesn’t highlight is the money behind that message. The foundation collected nearly 90 percent of its $5 million in funding last year from the drug and medical-device industry — and closely mirrors its positions, an examination by ProPublica found. Drug Companies Reduce Payments to Doctors as Scrutiny Mounts. Continued reporting on the influence of pharmaceutical money on medicine spurred tighter rules at medical schools across the nation.
Treating the tiny victims of Canada’s fastest-growing addiction. Hours after his birth, stiff-limbed and trembling, Carter was whisked away to a bassinet in a neonatal intensive care unit and fed morphine through a dropper.
He broke out in sweats, a fine sheen clinging to his neck and scalp, when, weeks later, nurses started to wean him off. His mother, Laura, who asked to be identified by her first name only, knew exactly what he was going through: She’d experienced withdrawal before. Gregory Bunt, M.D.: The Prescription Opiate Arms Race. Plans for the manufacture and sale of hydrocodone pills five to 10 times more potent than is now available and sold under the brand name Vicodin and others is a warning sign of an escalation of what we might call the "prescription opiate arms race" among pharmaceutical companies.
They are competing in a race to develop a stronger super-potent narcotic drug. Reports surfaced last month that four pharmaceutical companies are attempting to develop a drug containing pure hydrocodone in high dosages per tablet. As Oxycontin abuse spreads, pharmacy robberies rising. BIDDEFORD, Maine | Police Chief Roger P.
Beaupre has seen his share of criminal trends in 30 years on the job, but he was taken aback recently when residents of this quiet coastal city were urged to turn in their unused prescription medications. Ontario inquest probes rising number of fatal oxycodone overdoses. Brockville, Ont. — Looking back, Dr. Alan Redekopp said his family medical practice is better off now that he has been barred from prescribing narcotics and forced to appear before a disciplinary board this fall over his prescription practices. Oxycontin may hook teens more easily than adults. NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The powerful painkiller Oxycontin may be even more addictive for adolescents than it is for adults, new research in mice suggests.
Fewer U.S. teens are using illegal drugs, but the abuse of prescription drugs, such as Oxycontin (generic oxycodone) and Vicodin (generic hydrocodone) is rising, Dr. Mary Jeanne Kreek and colleagues from The Rockefeller University in New York City report. The brain undergoes dramatic changes in adolescence, they add, and there is evidence that abusing opioids during this key developmental period may cause permanent brain alterations that increase the likelihood that a teen will be more vulnerable to addiction compared with those who first abuse this drugs as adults. To better understand the brain chemistry and addiction risks involved in adolescent Oxycontin use, the researchers studied self-administration of the drug in 4-week-old, or "adolescent," mice and 10-week-old adults. The selling of OxyContin.
Blackwell on Health: OxyContin and the poor. OxyContin: Purdue Pharma's painful medicine. Feds refuse to limit production of deadly Oxycodone. An epidemic of Oxycodone abuse has struck America in the last decade. The number of emergency room visits stemming from nonmedical abuse of the narcotic prescription painkiller drug rose by 256 percent between 2004 and 2009, according to the U.S. government's Drug Abuse Warning Network.
As abuse mounted, DEA boosted painkiller supply - Drugs. An epidemic of Oxycodone abuse has struck America in the last decade. The number of emergency room visits stemming from non-medical abuse of the narcotic prescription painkiller drug rose by 256 percent between 2004 and 2009, according to the U.S. government’s Drug Abuse Warning Network. In March 2010, Washington state Attorney General Rob McKenna said his state was “losing more people to prescription drug overdoses in a typical year than to traffic accidents.”