OXY Morons

Drug company lies are like war propaganda. They lead to death and suffering. Why do people still trust them?

Drug company propaganda is much like government war propaganda. The goal is to convince people that the war profiteers and drug pushers are actually trying to help humanity when in fact, they are murderous scum who hate us and want us sick and dead. Case in point, the OXYContin story.

I illustrated an excellent piece written by By Erik Ofgang

on April 24, 2016 for The Connecticut Insider exposing the evil deeds of Purdue labs. Here is an excerpt:

The prescription opioid OxyContin became “a focal point of opioid abuse issues that would continue to escalate into the late 2000s and beyond,” according to the Food and Drug Administration. Four in five new heroin users started by abusing prescription painkillers. Overdose deaths in the U.S. involving prescription opioids have quadrupled since 1999. Meanwhile, a Stamford pharmaceutical giant has made billions of dollars from sales of OxyContin.

“Your pot of gold awaits you ‘Over the Rainbow’!” the Purdue Pharma training memo informed sales reps in November 1996. The Connecticut pharmaceutical company was in the midst of launching the biggest marketing campaign for a narcotic in history for its new time-release painkiller OxyContin. The memo instructed sales reps on making effective presentations about the drug to doctors, and encouraged them to look to an unlikely source for inspiration: the yellow brick road.

"In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy had a clear-cut objective. She knew exactly what she wanted … According to the munchkins, the Right Approach (how to accomplish this task) was to take the Yellow Brick Road … As doctors’ scheduling demands are getting tighter, you need to more effectively plan your presentations … Know your listener and his/her needs/wants … As you prepare to fire your ‘message’ you need to know where to aim and what you want to hit! The physician wants pain relief for these patients without addicting them to an opioid … According to the FDA, stated in the OxyContin package insert, ‘Delayed absorption, as provided by OxyContin tablets, is believed to reduce the abuse liability of a drug.”

Dr. Jane Ballantyne began as a believer. In the late ’90s, the pain specialist wholeheartedly prescribed to the medical doctrine of the day: prescription opioids were vital for patients with chronic pain, had limited potential for addiction and, when it came to strength of dosage, the sky was literally the limit.

“The thought was the only way you can get good analgesia [pain relief] is to increase the dose until you get pain relief, so in other words there is no ceiling dose. And the teaching also was that you’re very unlucky to get addiction,” recalls Ballantyne.

But as the head of pain treatment at Massachusetts General in Boston, she began to notice something strange. Her patients on OxyContin or opioids weren’t getting better. In fact, the higher the dose, the worse the patients seemed. “We did a complete evidence review and found that there was actually no evidence for what we were being taught to do, mainly by pharma,” Ballantyne says.

Of 16 early clinical trials on the subject, five were funded by Purdue and an OxyContin distributor, two were co-authored by Purdue employees, and two were sponsored by other drug companies producing opioids. In addition, one of the key studies sponsored by Purdue “omitted suspected cases of withdrawal symptoms.”

Purdue pushed the narrative that victims of chronic pain were suffering needlessly without access to opioids, and in the years after the drug was first released continuously stated that less than 1 percent of patients became addicted to opioids. It proved an inaccurate claim for which there was little legitimate scientific support.

“No one prior to Purdue had marketed a high-strength narcotic in the way that Purdue would,” he says. It was released in 1996 with a Food and Drug Administration-approved label that downplayed the risk of addiction. At its height OyxContin, accounted for only 4 percent of prescription opioid sales, and has generally averaged around 2 percent. However, the FDA would conclude that soon after its release it became “a focal point of abuse issues that would continue to escalate into the late and beyond.”

Since OxyContin’s release, Purdue has generated sales of more than $35 billion. The drug’s success and its marketing helped turn the U.S. into the world’s largest consumer of opioid medications — with less than 5 percent of the global population, it consumes an estimated 80 percent of prescription opioid painkillers.In 2015, the Sackler family, which owns the private company, was named to Forbes’ list of the 20 richest U.S. families. The magazine dubbed them the “OxyContin Clan” and estimated their net worth at $14 billion.

Over time, many opioid addictions morphed into heroin addictions, as heroin offered the same high, often for less money. According to the American Society of Addiction Medicine, four in five new heroin users started out misusing prescription painkillers. “As a consequence, the rate of heroin overdose deaths nearly quadrupled from 2000 to 2013. During this 14-year period, the rate of heroin overdose showed an average increase of 6 percent per year from 2000 to 2010, followed by a larger average increase of 37 percent per year from 2010 to 2013.”

There were also questions of conflict of interest between Purdue and the FDA. In 2002, the FDA convened a key meeting to refine its opioid policy and invited 10 outside experts for advice. According to the Washington Post, “Five of them reported having served as speakers or investigators for Purdue. Three others reported working as speakers for or as advisers and consultants to other pharmaceutical companies.” Portenoy, a clear proponent of more opioid use with financial ties to Purdue, was among the advisers.

OXY by the numbers: ( As of 2016)

$19.5 million The amount Connecticut and 25 other states and the District of Columbia received through a settlement with Purdue Pharma in May 2007 after a lawsuit regarding the manner in which OxyContin was marketed.

$600 million The amount Purdue Pharma agreed to pay, also in May 2007, in fines and other payments following the company’s guilty plea in federal court regarding “misbranding” of OxyContin.

$3 billion What Purdue Pharma is currently believed to earn annually in sales, mostly from OxyContin.

$14 billion The estimated net worth of the Sackler family, Purdue Pharma’s owners.

$35 billion Purdue Pharma’s estimated sales revenue since OxyContin was released in 1996.

(The above by Eric Ofgang)

My question to you smart people of Substack remains:

“Why do people still trust official narratives from drug companies and governments when they have been proven ad-nauseum to be lying, cheating murderers?

Help me understand. .

Please. Thank you.

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