2024-05-30
40 分钟Thanks to legal settlements with drug makers and distributors, states have plenty of money to boost prevention and treatment. Will it work? (Part two of a two-part series.)
When I say the opioid crisis or the opioid epidemic, you probably say, enough already.
I understand you are sick of hearing about it.
We are more than 25 years in.
If you use the introduction of OxyContin as the onset of this crisis, which most smart people in the field do.
OxyContin is a powerful medical pain reliever that its manufacturer, Purdue Pharma, promised would not addict its users the way other opioids can.
This was a big deal, since many millions of people seek out pain relief, whether intermittently or regularly.
But that non addictive promise, it turned out to be wrong.
Addiction to OxyContin and then similar drugs from other pharma firms spiraled into a public health catastrophe.
In 20, 23, 81,000 people in the US died from an opioid overdose, more than ten times the number in 1999.
So the problem has continued to worsen.
Many of the current overdoses arent from prescription drugs like OxyContin, but from black market versions, or from other drugs that contain fentanyl.
Thats another synthetic opioid that began as a medical drug and which is far more powerful than most opioids.
Fentanyl has now worked its way into the supply of street drugs in the US, most of it smuggled across the mexican border by american citizens.
A great many people, policymakers, medical professionals and regulators, parents, law enforcement, they've all spent the past few decades trying to end the opioid crisis, but without much success.
So as sick as you may be of hearing about it, imagine being the parent of someone who died from fentanyl, or the husband, or the child.
Although you might not have to imagine, you probably know someone who's experienced this kind of tragedy.
It's that common.
Last week, in part one of this two part series, we asked a simple why?
Why is the opioid crisis still raging after all these years?
There are actually a lot of correct answers to that question.