A completely legal analgesic produces more dead than illegal drugs

ByPhil Renaud

The cause of death of a person who died by substance abuse is known as a pain medication prescribed by a doctor, not heroin or cocaine that is strictly controlled, according to the investigation in 2014. Why has abuse of painkillers currently considered problematic in the United States? And what kind of solutions are there? A movie that is easy to understand about things like being published on YouTube.

Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug - YouTube


In 2014, as many as 47,000 people in the United StatesOverdose(Overdose of drugs) passed away.


However, the cause of overdose is neither cannabis, heroin nor cocaine that is considered illegal.


Many of the causes are completely legitimate "painkillers".


In the 1990s, the medical community was pressured by government and others "to eliminate pain is an important problem of medicine". In this era, 100 million AmericansChronic painIt was due to being bothered by.


To solve the pain, there were lots of people who ladders from doctors to doctors but still can not solve the problem.


There is also pressure from the outside, doctorsOpioidI will prescribe medicine of the system as an analgesic. Opioid acts on the nervous system and sends a message to the brain to "reduce pain".


The doctors used opioid analgesics,Purdue PharmaAnd other major pharmaceutical companies have said that "opioid analgesics are less dependent than other analgesics and are safe". However, in fact, there was not such a thing at all.


In fact, Purdue Pharma pays a fine of $ 635 million (about 72 billion yen) in 2007 saying "I have shown a lie's view."


In 2012, the prescription of opioid analgesics written by pharmacists reached 259 million.


This is a calculation that adults in the US have one bottle of opioid analgesics per person.


In proportion to the sales of opioid analgesics, the incidence of fatal accidents caused by opioid analgesics has also increased.


In 2014, the number of deaths caused by overdose caused by opioid analgesics is about 19,000 cases. This is about 40% of the total overdose caused by drugs.


It depends on an analgesic correctly prescribed to the doctor, and it is born the result that it will eventually die.


Although heroin, which is regarded as illegal, is also one type of opioid, it is thought that people using opioid analgesics are 40 times more likely to be addicted to heroin than those who do not.


In addition, the number of overdose caused by heroin has been increased to nearly five times between 2000 and 2014.


President Obama who saw the situation seriously raised drug countermeasures, including strengthening training on prescribing side, and assigned a billion dollar (about 110 billion yen) budget to the problem countermeasure.


However, when an opioid analgesic can not be used, another therapeutic agent is needed to treat chronic pain.


Medical marijuana is drawing attention here.


In the United States there is a state that is regulated for the use of medical cannabis and there is a state that is not yet in the early stage of research on safety, but there are many opinions that it is less toxic and effective for chronic pain I will.


Also, in case of marijuana, if you smoke like tobacco at onceIt does not cause overdose unless it ingests 680 kgSo it is unlikely that the number of deaths will rise like opioid analgesics.


Research results suggesting that the use of medical cannabis may solve the abuse of analgesics infesting the United States has also been announced.