Imagine a medical industry that’s supposed to keep a nation healthy but, becomes so completely corrupt that it causes an epidemic. This has become a reality in the United States where opioids have caused about 50,000 deaths per year, according to recent figures, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Countless other lives have been destroyed through addiction. In the United States, drug overdoses are a leading cause of death in people under 50. That’s a lot to take in but, imagine if most of this tragedy was caused by powerful pharmaceutical companies being driven by greed. That greed has put us in the middle of an epidemic that is being called the worst public health crisis in our history.
One of the worst offenders in the corporate world of drug-pushing is the Sackler family, owners of Purdue Pharma, which has raked in a huge fortune marketing drugs such as OxyContin, which is its patented version of oxycodone, marketed for decades as a safe, effective analgesic for chronic pain.
The Sackler family is not only partly responsible for the epidemic but has also made a multibillion-dollar Empire from it. That one family is merely symptomatic of how billionaires and doctors have become drug dealers. Purdue convinced doctors that OxyContin had a low addiction rate, but that turned out to be false. The pill is stronger than morphine and, with other prescription opioids, is said to have helped trigger a crisis that has killed more than 200,000 people in the US from 1999 to 2016, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The problem begins when patients are given strong painkillers when in the hospital for surgery or chronic pain. While the drugs are life-enabling for many patients to avoid excruciating pain from injury or sickness, many fall into addiction cycles from withdrawal. Some people graduate from prescription pharmaceuticals to cheaper and more potent alternatives, like heroin or fentanyl. The cases and causes are numerous and variable, but research indicates that there is a strong correlation between regions with high opioid prescription rates and high overdose rates. “Dopesick,” starring Michael Keaton, is an excellent movie about the opioid crisis.
The opioid epidemic in the United States was caused by a variety of factors, but the bottom line was always the profit motive, rather than the health of the patients who relied on the professionals to adhere to the Hippocratic Oath; “First, do no harm.” Instead, the owners of Purdue pushed OxyContin to everyday people who had little use for the drug. To do it, they corrupted the entire supply chain, employing armies of sales reps, paying off doctors, lobbying for favorable regulations, making billions while masses fell into devastating addiction. They had no concern for the addictive properties of their drugs, they were only concerned with the profit-making bottom line.
That level of sadistic greed, which destroyed the lives of thousands, should have been more than enough to penalize the owners with long prison terms. Instead, they have paid settlements in the multi-billion dollar range, while continuing to be worth billions, which they made by systematically committing mass murder with their poisons. The difference between them and the nefarious Mexican drug cartels is that Big Pharma spread enough money around to enable them to distribute their drugs legally.
All of this is reminiscent of the tobacco company executives, all of whom were wealthy greed heads, who sat in front of congressional committees and swore they had no knowledge of the cancer-producing effects of their products. They too paid huge fines, but not nearly enough to dent their ill-gotten fortunes. This should serve as a warning to anyone about to undergo surgery, or other medical procedures, to be careful about the drugs recommended for their pain. It may relieve the immediate problem, but it could set in motion a long period of anxiety, sleep deprivation, and addiction. In the final analysis, we’re all responsible for our own health. Consequently, we shouldn’t let blind obedience make us willing victims of our own downfall.