At Knuckleheads Bar & Grill, the subject on a sweltering Saturday afternoon was the drug crisis. More specifically, the recent disclosure that the CVS across the street received more pain pills — 6.4 million — over a seven-year period than any other drugstore in Cuyahoga County. “Location, location, location,” said Mike Gorman, 37, who was […]
Behind Pence’s Air Force Two Cancellation: A Drug Dealer…
Vice President Mike Pence was one short plane ride away from shaking hands with an alleged interstate drug dealer. Pence abruptly canceled his trip to Manchester, N.H., earlier this month but never said why he was pulled from Air Force Two at the last minute. The vice president’s aides and even President Donald Trump himself […]
DOJ Obtains $1.4 Billion from Reckitt Benckiser Group in Largest Recovery in a Case Concerning an Opioid Drug Yet…
Global consumer goods conglomerate Reckitt Benckiser Group plc (RB Group) has agreed to pay $1.4 billion to resolve its potential criminal and civil liability related to a federal investigation of the marketing of the opioid addiction treatment drug Suboxone. The resolution – the largest recovery by the United States in a case concerning an opioid […]
12 Million Pills and 700 Deaths: How a Few Pill Mills Helped Fan the U.S. Opioid Inferno by Del Quentin Wilber…
Soon after he took over as medical director of the Urgent Care & Surgery Center in eastern Tennessee in 2012, Dr. Marc Valley realized he was supervising illegal drug dealers in lab coats. Platoons of patients socialized in the parking lot, none seemingly afflicted by injuries. The packed waiting room echoed with chatter about how […]
How Sackler Became the Most Toxic Name in Philanthropy…
Purdue Infiltrated WHO, Manipulated Opioid Policies to Boost Sales…
Infamous OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma used front organizations and sponsored research to deceive the World Health Organization and corrupt global public health policies with the goal of boosting international opioid sales and profits, according to a Congressional report(PDF) released Thursday, May 22. The investigation identified two WHO guidance documents that appear to parrot some of Purdue’s […]
How Joe Biden’s Drug Policies Supercharged the Opioid Crisis…
In April, as he prepared to announce his presidential candidacy, Joe Biden went on an apology tour that noticeably stopped short of issuing any apologies. He called Anita Hill and, in the words of a campaign statement, shared “his regret for what she endured” at the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, which […]
U.S. Security Experts Raise Questions About China’s Fentanyl Promise…
China has pledged to stem a flood of the synthetic opioid fentanyl onto America’s streets, where it kills thousands of people a month, but U.S. security experts are skeptical about whether Beijing is willing, or even able, to follow through. Ten current and former U.S. officials, congressional sources and China and trade experts told Reuters […]
Insys Defendants Bribed Doctors to Prescribe Painkillers to Those That Didn’t Need It…
Five former executives of Insys Therapeutics, including its founder, onetime billionaire John N. Kapoor, were convicted Thursday of racketeering conspiracy for bribing doctors to prescribe a highly addictive painkiller to patients who didn’t need it and tricking insurers into paying for it. In what was believed to be the first criminal trial of pharmaceutical executives […]
27 West Virginia Hospitals Join Together to Sue Opioid Companies Including Purdue Pharma…
Twenty-seven West Virginia hospitals and 10 affiliated Kentucky hospitals joined together to sue opioid companies for monetary damages, including Purdue Pharma, Monday. “Imagine what the hospitals — who are the entities of last resort — have gone through as part of this [opioid] crisis,” said the hospitals’ lawyer, Stephen B. Farmer, according to the Associated […]