Five more states sue OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma for opioid epidemic

[Tiwack]

Never play around with drugs or medicine. Addictive stuff is especially dangerous to people in an already compromised position, that's how you get addicts and why you never get the good stuff unless you're about to murder someone to stop your pain. You'll be hooked, it'll suck, a battle of wills with yourself, it either makes or breaks you and will be given a hard pass by anyone in a position to choose for themselves. Shit'll stay with you forever and handing out pills like candy is naturally a recipe for disaster.

[AeneasBK]

If the conventions are anything like the UK ones I'm pretty sure a fair handful of doctors were bribed convinced that it was a great prescription to give out by the producers. That kind of behaviour is so much the norm that I'm guessing anyone not adopting it is simply never going to sell any pills, regardless of whether they cured cancer, aids, and heart disease all in one.

[JohnBrown1917]

False equivalency. Go away with this dumb as bricks argument. You really need to stop and read what you just said and try to realize how wrong you are.



Exploit in what way? This has nothing to do with liberalism. You're made with capitalism. When will you commies ever learn that selling a product isn't exploitation.

lol you truly have no idea what liberalism idealogy is about, do you?
Please, go on, make a fool of yourself even more.


p.s
I'm an Anarchist lol

[Low Hanging Fruit]

I remember in 1996 or 7 I twisted my ankle pretty good playing basketball at the park and the doctor wrote me a script for oxycontin. Don't get me wrong it was a pretty bad injury as in no walking on it or anything for a good couple weeks but my god I remember him telling me it would be like normal pain killers but without the side effects. I got home, crutched my way into my apartment, and took one while I was eating a frosty from Wendys which I had stopped and gotten because it said I had to eat something with it. Holy fuck was I in outer space for like 7 hours just laying on my bed in cold sweats. Woke up the next morning with frosty all over my shirt, arms, and fucking bed.

By the time the injury was fixed I had serious desires to continue doing the drug. Was one of those times that being young, broke, and living in the American healthcare system where it paid off because I couldn't con my way into more.

Fuck Oxycontin. Sure, someone with late stage cancer or something in massive amounts of pain could use it because what is there to lose. But for much anything else beyond that it is totally beyond me why it would be used for anything outside of death bed situations. They knew better and deserve to pay out the ass for it.

[PACOX]

Unless there's some deep conspiracy where they were manipulating information about opioids then the lawsuits are just a distraction.

No one tells a doctor to to give someone 30 oxys for a sprained ankle.



They didn't tell states to cut funding for rehab programs if someone ends up forming a habit. They aren't running pill mills.

They are part of the problem but states aren't fixing the problem.

[Shadowferal]

Exploit in what way? This has nothing to do with liberalism. You're made with capitalism. When will you commies ever learn that selling a product isn't exploitation.

When the fuck did capitalism (worshiping money) equate to being a communist?

[Orbitus]

Each state has its own army of lawyers. There's like 4,400 lawyers going up against Purdue Pharma and it's former CEO.

Do you think the suit is justified?

If they are sending hundreds of thousands to millions of pills, to say small town stores, and not reporting it to the DEA or whatever specific agency they need to, and there is no reason for a small town to need millions of pills other than an epidemic of opioid abuses. If they are just sending the pills to sell them, then they are absolutely liable.

[I Push Buttons]

Unless there's some deep conspiracy where they were manipulating information about opioids then the lawsuits are just a distraction.

No one tells a doctor to to give someone 30 oxys for a sprained ankle.

Ackchyually

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/...to-push-opioid

[Pooti]

Exactly what do you do with the pills that your doctor tells you to take?

Your doctor actually says, take these as needed for pain. Also, that is the doctor, not the corporation. Drugs being addictive is like saying water is wet.

- - - Updated - - -

They do so at the prescription provided by the doctor... And, you know... patients tend to listen to their doctor?

Pain pills are not compulsory.

[Pooti]

Because McDonalds, Hostess, and Pepsi are prescribed by your doctor to deal with very real issues? No? Didn't think so.

Once again, the DOCTOR should be warning people of the addictive nature, just in case a person just landed on planet earth and is not aware of the addictive nature of drugs. The doctors are to blame for becoming drug dealers writing out continuous prescriptions.

[PACOX]

Ackchyually

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/...to-push-opioid

The doctors are licensed professionals with free agency, so that would make them dope pushers. We don't just let dope pushers off do we?

- - - Updated - - -

Yeah, we have evidence that everything you're dismissing here happened. Read up on this shit.

Yeah, what did I dismiss? My argument is that Purdue is only a part of the problem and suing them is nothing but a bandaid of they're even held liable.

[I Push Buttons]

The doctors are licensed professionals with free agency, so that would make them dope pushers. We don't just let dope pushers off do we?

I have no qualms with punishing physicians who accept bribes and unnecessarily prescribe opiods.

[Orange Joe]

The doctors are licensed professionals with free agency, so that would make them dope pushers. We don't just let dope pushers off do we?

We normally use them to get the ones above them. Kinda like they are doing now......

[Kasierith]

If they are sending hundreds of thousands to millions of pills, to say small town stores, and not reporting it to the DEA or whatever specific agency they need to, and there is no reason for a small town to need millions of pills other than an epidemic of opioid abuses. If they are just sending the pills to sell them, then they are absolutely liable.

Is this something that has actually happened? Because it seems exceedingly unlikely, as it would have to pass through several other companies and numerous employees without any notice at all. Important thing to note first is that drug companies do not just send medications to pharmacies or doctors. A company cannot just ship 50 boxes of 12 100ct bottles percocet to a doctors office and say hey have fun it's on us. A pharmacy must order via a DEA 222 form and only a DEA 222 form (all written by had and mailed to the drug distributor), no other means of ordering allowed, and while I'm unaware of the specifics of how they order doctors offices cannot place bulk orders. They must submit an order for specific patients and quantities with sufficient documentation, and that sample is very limit with the days supply or quantity allowed based on state laws.

Next, the drug distribution company, such as Cardinal, which warehouses medications regionally and provides both 1-2 day shipment orders and control/narcotic orders. It is not possible for branches in, say, the five states in question to go bad because all narcotic orders are authenticated, processed, and reported from the same area (reason why it typically takes 2-3 days instead of 1-2). After processed at the HQ, the regional warehouse also records everything, and then ships it out to the pharmacy or doctors offices. Cardinal reports everything to the DEA.

After that, the DEA. There are limits on how many controlled medications of each type a pharmacy and doctors office can distribute. There is variation in this, based on patient population and historical trends; a pain clinic is going to have a larger allowed amount than an obgyn. /there is also a maximum amount that they will not go forther on. And they definitely do enforce this limit and check to see what's going on if you start edging close to it. A pharmacy I worked at was centrally located right in a medical complex next to hospice cancer treatment after surgery care dental surgeons and a whole host of other heavier medical stuff, so we always, every month, brushed right up to the allowed limit and had a DEA agent call or visit to get an official on record statement as to why we were dispensing so many and were getting in that area of being close to the max allowed.

Then after that, the recipient. To give an idea of the checks in place, when I take a C2 (narcotic order), I open the tote in the presence of the drug distributor employee, verify all quantities, circle sign and date the invoice for records, fill out the corresponding part of the DEA 222 form confirming receipt, and scan in every bottle to the electronic system which checks all quantities shipped from the vendor with what we received. All of this is done under camera. If you've ever stopped by a pharmacy and the pharmacist is ignoring everyone including patients to take an order, it's a C2 order and they're ignoring everything else because every step must be executed properly. If it doesn't, if there's any variance in what was ordered, red flags go off right away. For us, the fine for a single line being off, one, missing a date, putting in the incorrect quantity received on the paper, missing a personal signature on any line... every single one of those mistakes in my state is a five figure fine up to $50,000 each.

So, I'm not saying that the scenario you've listed is impossible. But it would require grand conspiracy to pull off, with a participating drug company, drug distribution warehouse, pharmacy or doctors office, lax DEA, and no individuals on the ground at any of these areas blowing the whistle to pull off. It's far more likely that what you've heard is either hyperbolic, or flat out incorrect.

[I Push Buttons]

Is this something that has actually happened?

First Google result:

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-...a-town-of-3-00

21 million oxycodone and hydrocodone pills sent to a town with two pharmacies servicing only 3000 people between 2008 and 2015.

[Orbitus]

Is this something that has actually happened? Because it seems exceedingly unlikely, as it would have to pass through several other companies and numerous employees without any notice at all. Important thing to note first is that drug companies do not just send medications to pharmacies or doctors. A company cannot just ship 50 boxes of 12 100ct bottles percocet to a doctors office and say hey have fun it's on us. A pharmacy must order via a DEA 222 form and only a DEA 222 form (all written by had and mailed to the drug distributor), no other means of ordering allowed, and while I'm unaware of the specifics of how they order doctors offices cannot place bulk orders. They must submit an order for specific patients and quantities with sufficient documentation, and that sample is very limit with the days supply or quantity allowed based on state laws.

Next, the drug distribution company, such as Cardinal, which warehouses medications regionally and provides both 1-2 day shipment orders and control/narcotic orders. It is not possible for branches in, say, the five states in question to go bad because all narcotic orders are authenticated, processed, and reported from the same area (reason why it typically takes 2-3 days instead of 1-2). After processed at the HQ, the regional warehouse also records everything, and then ships it out to the pharmacy or doctors offices. Cardinal reports everything to the DEA.

After that, the DEA. There are limits on how many controlled medications of each type a pharmacy and doctors office can distribute. There is variation in this, based on patient population and historical trends; a pain clinic is going to have a larger allowed amount than an obgyn. /there is also a maximum amount that they will not go forther on. And they definitely do enforce this limit and check to see what's going on if you start edging close to it. A pharmacy I worked at was centrally located right in a medical complex next to hospice cancer treatment after surgery care dental surgeons and a whole host of other heavier medical stuff, so we always, every month, brushed right up to the allowed limit and had a DEA agent call or visit to get an official on record statement as to why we were dispensing so many and were getting in that area of being close to the max allowed.

Then after that, the recipient. To give an idea of the checks in place, when I take a C2 (narcotic order), I open the tote in the presence of the drug distributor employee, verify all quantities, circle sign and date the invoice for records, fill out the corresponding part of the DEA 222 form confirming receipt, and scan in every bottle to the electronic system which checks all quantities shipped from the vendor with what we received. All of this is done under camera. If you've ever stopped by a pharmacy and the pharmacist is ignoring everyone including patients to take an order, it's a C2 order and they're ignoring everything else because every step must be executed properly. If it doesn't, if there's any variance in what was ordered, red flags go off right away. For us, the fine for a single line being off, one, missing a date, putting in the incorrect quantity received on the paper, missing a personal signature on any line... every single one of those mistakes in my state is a five figure fine up to $50,000 each.

So, I'm not saying that the scenario you've listed is impossible. But it would require grand conspiracy to pull off, with a participating drug company, drug distribution warehouse, pharmacy or doctors office, lax DEA, and no individuals on the ground at any of these areas blowing the whistle to pull off. It's far more likely that what you've heard is either hyperbolic, or flat out incorrect.

Yes, it is something that happened.

Town of 2900 people, received almost 21 million opioid pills between 2006 and 2016. Doesn't sound too bad right? 2.1 million pills per year? That is close to 7300 pills a person over that 10 year period. https://www.vox.com/science-and-heal...inia-shipments

How bout a town of 392 that got 9 million pills in a 2 YEAR period? Same article.

The fact that shipping companies sent them the pills and didn't report it, and the manufacturers, sent the pills to the distributors and didn't say anything, then yeah it is on the distributor and the manufacturer.

[Kasierith]

First Google result:

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-...a-town-of-3-00

21 million oxycodone and hydrocodone pills sent to a town with two pharmacies servicing only 3000 people between 2008 and 2015.

And those were pill mills. Where reciprocating doctors and pharmacies (sometimes in the same building) deliberately place massive orders based on falsified prescriptions to the drug distribution company and the DEA agents assigned to the area do not make an effort to look into the matter. A massive problem, one that specifically has inflicted massive damage in West Virginia and Ohio. But also not the scenario Orbitus described, and does not involve drug companies like Purdue in any way as they were not involved on any level.

[breslin]

I blame the FDA and the prescribing doctors more than the pharmacy company.

[Kasierith]

Yes, it is something that happened.

Town of 2900 people, received almost 21 million opioid pills between 2006 and 2016. Doesn't sound too bad right? 2.1 million pills per year? That is close to 7300 pills a person over that 10 year period. https://www.vox.com/science-and-heal...inia-shipments

How bout a town of 392 that got 9 million pills in a 2 YEAR period? Same article.

The fact that shipping companies sent them the pills and didn't report it, and the manufacturers, sent the pills to the distributors and didn't say anything, then yeah it is on the distributor and the manufacturer.

See above. Primary parties at fault are the colluding pharmacists and doctors, the DEA and the distributing companies are at fault for negligence, and the drug company is pretty much uninvolved because at that level you have one distribution company warehouse servicing potentially hundreds of pharmacies meaning that even large spikes are absorbed in the mass.

[Kasierith]

They were sending the medication. They're basically the cartel to the street level dealer. They were also giving incentives to these people to continue to do this shit.

Incorrect. The drug company manufactures the product, sends it to the distribution company, who then sends it to warehouses based on expected load, and then sends it to pharmacies and doctors offices. Drug companies sell on much, much larger levels than rural towns.

As for incentives, if they existed they would have been irrelevant in the larger scheme of the pill mills express intent to violate the law and make massive amounts of money. A drug rep saying that hydromorphone spray for a sprained ankle is a good choice and giving a lap dance to push the point is a massive, MASSIVE fucking problem. That said, it's kind of a drop in the bucket compared to what the pill mills were doing.

You can even see that in the article. The law enforcement and city counsel didn't talk to the drug companies. They talked to the drug distribution company.