Prescription Drug Epidemic - Psychiatrists

[Guest guest]

The majority of people that are addicted to psychiatric drugs are the

legal compliant patients who are taking the drugs legally, but are

unaware that they have grown psyically and psychologically dependent

on the drugs. When any " side effects " of their addiction show up they

are then told that the side effects are part of their " mental illness "

and why they " need this medicine " . If the patient every wakes up and

discoves that they are " accidentally addicted " then the blame is then

put upon the patient for " abusing " the medicine. Nice trick....the

pusher gets them hooked and then if they discover that they have been

hooked, the pusher and the ignorant society blames the victum, by

labeling them " abusers " of drugs. The real abuse is by doctors, drug

companies, and government agencies, politicians, etc. who have

concocted this farce of a medical system to sell and get people hooked

on poisons like these.

 

 

 

 

 

9 Jul 2005 20:34:46 -0000

 

Subject:Health Supreme Update: Prescription Drug Epidemic -

Psychiatrists 'Pushers'

sepp

 

 

Health Supreme Update: Prescription Drug Epidemic - Psychiatrists

'Pushers'

 

July 09, 2005

 

http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2005/07/09/prescription_drug_epidemic_psych\

iatrists_pushers.htm

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" Our nation is in the throes of an epidemic of controlled

prescription drug abuse and addiction, " said Joseph A.

Califano, Jr., CASA's chairman and president and former

U.S. Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare. " While

America has been congratulating itself in recent years on

curbing increases in alcohol and illicit drug abuse, and in the

decline in teen smoking, abuse of prescription drugs has been

stealthily, but sharply, rising. " It would appear that

something in wrong with the war on drugs highly touted by the

United Nations and almost all member states. The target isn't

right. In fact, prescription drugs quite legally produced by

pharmaceutical companies seem to outsell the the illegal

variety by far. But then perhaps, there is something wrong with

prohibition - period. Certainly prohibition seems to exacerbate the

problem - or so say the experts. Prohibition is what makes drugs

profitable.

 

Organized crime will fill the demand that cannot be legally filled

- and since to do so is profitable, the bosses will find ways to

" stimulate " business by hooking ever more souls to their deadly

business. Pushers do the dirty job.

 

Compare that with the epidemic of controlled prescription drugs

CASA is denouncing. Here we have a different kind of prohibition - the

suppression of alternatives to pharma's drugs. But we have pushers at

work all the same: Psychiatrists push for pharmaceutical drugging.

Psychiatric drug prescription algorithms have been put in place,

financed by big pharma.

 

There is even a program to test every man, woman and especially

the children for their need to undergo drugging at the hands of the

state. It's called TeenScreen and is being pushed - always with pharma

money and psychiatric backing. Psychiatrists are the pushers for

pharma's addictive drugs. But everything is legal - it's got

presidential approval.

 

Just how much prescription drugs have legally replaced street

drugs is amazing. See the comment on CASA's report by Vera Hassner

Sharav of the ALLIANCE FOR HUMAN RESEARCH PROTECTION:

 

- - -

 

" Our nation is in the throes of an epidemic of controlled

prescription drug abuse and addiction, " said Joseph A. Califano, Jr.,

CASA's chairman and president and former U.S. Secretary of Health,

Education and Welfare. " While America has been congratulating itself

in recent years on curbing increases in alcohol and illicit drug

abuse, and in the decline in teen smoking, abuse of prescription drugs

has been stealthily, but sharply, rising. "

 

A report by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse

at Columbia Universithy (CASA) about a survey of 979 physicians and

1,030 pharmacists from July 21 to October 31, 2004, provides shocking

findings about the explosive abuse of addictive prescription drugs:

 

" From 1992 to 2003, abuse of controlled prescription drugs grew at

a rate twice that of marijuana abuse; five times that of cocaine

abuse; 60 times that of heroin abuse. "

 

CASA notes: " The explosion in the prescription of addictive

opioids, depressants and stimulants has, for many children, made their

parents' medicine cabinet a greater temptation and threat than the

illegal street drug dealer. "

 

What the CASA report avoids is holding the real culprits of the

epidemic accountable:

 

This health epidemic is a consequence of the irresponsible

prescribing of controlled prescription drugs which have been widely

advertised. CASA acknowledges that the problem was NOT caused by

illicit street junkies, but the report fails to nail the obvious

culprits who enticed the public -- including impressionable children

-- to take drugs that promised to make them feel better than ever.

This drug epidemic is the consequence of a physician-pharmaceutical

orchestrated crime.

 

The medical / psychiatric community and its professional

organizations -- especially the American Medical Association, the

American Psychiatric Association, and the National Institute of Mental

Health. The AMA and APA are even now attempting to persuade the FDA to

withdraw the newly required label warnings about the risks posed by

antidepressants and stimulant drugs.

 

Physicians and medical institutions that have grown wealthy from

their collaboration with the pharmaceutical industry have created a

drug addiction epidemic that puts the community's safety at risk.

 

Perfectly healthy children, teenagers, pregnant women have become

victims of professional drug pushers who are licensed by the government.

 

These same partners in crime have a major financial investment in

ensuring a seamless steady flow of new customers for the most

expensive psychotropic drugs. To accomplish that goal, they have

embarked on a massive hunting expedition to ferret out undetected

mental health problems in children -- on the basis of a flawed

questionnaire whose purpose was designed to expand the client base.

TeenScreen has been unleashed in schools across America -- although no

such diagnostic method has ever been validated.

 

Nevertheless, TeenScreen has the seal of approval of state mental

health offices and the President's New Freedom Commission report -- a

commission that was riddled with conflicts of interest. Indeed, the

NFC promoted the most controversial psychotropic drug prescribing

guide -- TMAP (Texas Medication Algorithm Project) -- to ensure that

the most expensive drugs whose hazardous effects are only now being

revealed to the public would be prescribed.

 

Contrary to its claims that TeenScreen " does not receive financial

support from and is not affiliated with any pharmaceutical companiess "

the Tennesse State Department of Mental Health / Mental Retardation

acknowledges in an official publication that: " TeenScreen was funded

through grants from AdvoCare and Eli Lilly. "

 

 

Vera Hassner Sharav

212-595-8974

veracare

 

" CASA remains the only national organization that brings together

all the professional disciplines needed to combat abuse of all

substances in all sectors of society. "

 

- Joseph A. Califano, Jr., CASA Chairman and President

 

MORE THAN 15 MILLION AMERICANS ABUSE OPIOIDS, DEPRESSANTS, STIMULANTS

TEEN ABUSE TRIPLES IN 10 YEARS

 

NEW CASA REPORT: CONTROLLED PRESCRIPTION DRUG ABUSE AT EPIDEMIC LEVEL

 

WASHINGTON, July 7, 2005 – The number of Americans who abuse

controlled prescription drugs has nearly doubled from 7.8 million to

15.1 million from 1992 to 2003 and abuse among teens has more than

tripled during that time, according to a new report by The National

Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University.

 

Under the Counter: The Diversion and Abuse of Controlled

Prescription Drugs in the U.S., a 214-page CASA report detailing the

findings of an exhaustive three-year study of prescription opioids

(e.g., OxyContin, Vicodin), central nervous system (CNS) depressants

(e.g., Valium, Xanax) and CNS stimulants (e.g., Ritalin, Adderall),

found that from 1992 to 2003, while the U.S. population increased 14

percent, the number of 12 to 17 year olds who abused controlled

prescription drugs jumped 212 percent and the number of adults 18 and

older abusing such drugs climbed 81 percent.

 

The 15.1 million Americans abusing controlled prescription drugs

exceed the combined number abusing cocaine (5.9 million),

hallucinogens (4.0 million), inhalants (2.1 million) and heroin (.3

million).

 

" Our nation is in the throes of an epidemic of controlled

prescription drug abuse and addiction, " said Joseph A. Califano, Jr.,

CASA's chairman and president and former U.S. Secretary of Health,

Education and Welfare. " While America has been congratulating itself

in recent years on curbing increases in alcohol and illicit drug

abuse, and in the decline in teen smoking, abuse of prescription drugs

has been stealthily, but sharply, rising. "

 

Among the report's major findings:

 

· From 1992 to 2002, prescriptions written for controlled

drugs increased more than 150 percent, almost 12 times the rate of

increase in population and almost three times the rate of increase in

prescriptions written for all other drugs.

 

· From 1992 to 2003, the number of people abusing controlled

prescription drugs increased seven times faster than the increase in

the U.S. population.

 

· From 1992 to 2003, abuse of controlled prescription drugs

grew at a rate twice that of marijuana abuse; five times that of

cocaine abuse; 60 times that of heroin abuse.

 

· From 1992 to 2000 –

 

- The number of new opioid abusers grew by 225 percent; new

tranquilizer abusers, by 150 percent; new sedative abusers, by more

than 125 percent; new stimulant abusers, by more than 170 percent.

 

- The increase in new abusers 12 to 17 years old was far

greater than among adults (four times greater for opioids; three times

for tranquilizers and sedatives; two and one-half times for stimulants).

 

 

· From 1992 to 2002, new abuse of prescription opioids among

12 to 17 year olds was up an astounding 542 percent, more than four

times the rate of increase among adults.

 

· In 2003, 2.3 million 12 to 17 year olds (nearly one in 10)

abused at least one controlled prescription drug; for 83 percent of

them, the drug was opioids.

 

· In 2003, among 12 to 17 year olds, girls were likelier than

boys to abuse controlled prescription drugs (10.1 percent of girls vs.

8.6 percent of boys).

 

· Between 1991 and 2003, rates of lifetime steroid abuse among

high school students increased 126 percent, with abuse among girls up

by nearly 350 percent, compared to 66 percent among boys.

 

· Teens who abuse controlled prescription drugs are twice as

likely to use alcohol, five times likelier to use marijuana, 12 times

likelier to use heroin, 15 times likelier to use Ecstasy and 21 times

likelier to use cocaine, compared to teens who do not abuse such drugs.

 

 

Many Sources of Diversion

 

Controlled prescription drugs can be diverted from their lawful

medical purpose to illicit use from manufacturing facilities,

distributors, warehouses, pharmacies, hospitals, practitioners'

offices and patients' medicine cabinets. In CASA's unique national

surveys conducted in 2004, most physicians (59.1 percent) and

pharmacists (51.8 percent) blame patients, who can obtain controlled

prescription drugs by faking symptoms treated with opioids,

depressants and stimulants, visiting a number of doctors to obtain

prescriptions from each (doctor shopping), and altering prescriptions.

For children, access to controlled prescription drugs for the purpose

of diversion can be as close as a household medicine cabinet.

 

" The explosion in the prescription of addictive opioids,

depressants and stimulants has, for many children, made their parents'

medicine cabinet a greater temptation and threat than the illegal

street drug dealer. Parents who do not want to become inadvertent drug

pushers should consider locking their medicine cabinets, " said

Califano. " While many parents lock their liquor cabinets, most do

nothing to ensure that controlled prescription drugs are not

accessible to children. "

 

Internet Availability

 

In 2004, CASA and Beau Dietl & Associates (BDA) investigated the

availability of controlled prescription drugs over the Internet and

found hundreds of Web sites offering these addictive drugs for sale

without requiring a prescription and without regard to age. BDA

investigators found that only six percent of the sites required a

prescription, and virtually none restricted in any way the sale of

controlled prescription drugs to children.

 

A year later in 2005, BDA repeated its investigation and found

little had changed. In fact, opioids were offered on considerably more

sites in 2005 and a larger percentage of sites indicated that drugs

would be shipped from within the United States. BDA conducted a

similar analysis with steroids and found that 95 percent of sites that

sell these drugs do not require a prescription.

 

" Anyone with a credit card and Internet access can get their hands

on these dangerous drugs, " noted Beau Dietl, BDA's chairman and chief

executive officer. " Like predators in the forest, these vultures that

call themselves `Internet pharmacies' hide in the darkness of

cyberspace, where they hunt down and feast on our children, then

disappear only to return another day under a new name and in search of

new prey. "

 

 

Consequences of Abuse

 

The CASA report's analysis of emergency room data confirms the

sharp increase in abuse of controlled prescription drugs and its

consequences.

 

In 2002, controlled prescription drugs were implicated in 29.9

percent of drug related emergency room deaths. Opioids were implicated

in 18.9 percent of such deaths compared to 15.2 percent for cocaine,

12.6 percent for heroin and 2.6 percent for marijuana.

 

· In 2002, abuse of controlled prescription drugs was

implicated in at least 23 percent of drug-related emergency department

admissions.

 

· Between 1994 and 2002, controlled prescription drug-related

emergency room mentions increased by nearly 80 percent, with opioid

mentions jumping 168 percent, far more sharply than the increases of

48 percent for heroin and 39 percent for cocaine, and second only to

the 198 percent increase in marijuana mentions.

 

Comprehensive Approach Needed

 

As a result of its findings, the CASA report calls for an all

fronts effort to reduce abuse of controlled prescription drugs,

including a major public health education and prevention campaign,

better training of physicians, pharmacists and other health care

professionals, new laws and better law enforcement to close down rogue

Internet sites peddling controlled prescription drugs, Food and Drug

Administration and pharmaceutical company efforts to reformulate

controlled substances to make abuse more difficult, improved

treatment, and additional research.

 

The CASA report Under the Counter: The Diversion and Abuse of

Controlled Prescription Drugs in the U.S., is based on three years of

intensive work, including landmark surveys of physicians and of

pharmacists, more than 200 interviews, seven focus groups, a national

conference on substance abuse and pain management, an extensive and

unprecedented analysis of 15 national data sets by CASA's Substance

Abuse Data Analysis Center (SADAC), an Internet investigation by Beau

Dietl & Associates, and a review of more than 2000 publications. CASA

has used the latest data available, which varies among the national

data sets. Highlights of the physician and pharmacist surveys are

attached.

 

CASA is the only national organization that brings together under

one roof all the professional disciplines needed to study and combat

all types of substance abuse as they affect all aspects of society.

CASA has issued more than 50 reports, has conducted demonstration

projects focused on children, families and schools at 89 sites in 41

cities in 22 states, and has been testing the effectiveness of drug

and alcohol treatment, monitoring 15,000 individuals in more than 200

programs and five drug courts in 26 states. CASA is the creator of the

nationwide Family Day initiative – the fourth Monday in September –

that promotes parental engagement as a simple and effective way to

reduce children's risk of smoking, drinking and using illegal drugs.

To become a CASA member, please visit www.casacolumbia.org and click

" Become a Member " on the main menu or send an e-mail to

membership for more information.

 

 

# # #

 

Highlights of CASA Surveys of Physicians and Pharmacists on

Diversion and Abuse of Controlled Prescription Drugs

 

 

Physician Survey Highlights

 

· 43.3 percent of physicians do not ask about prescription

drug abuse when taking a patient's health history.

 

· 33 percent do not regularly call or obtain records from the

patient's previous (or other treating) physician before prescribing

controlled drugs on a long-term basis.

 

· 47.1 percent say that patients commonly try to pressure them

into prescribing a controlled drug.

 

· 74.1 percent have refrained from prescribing controlled

drugs during the past 12 months because of concern that a patient

might become addicted to them.

 

· 59.1 percent believe that patients account for the bulk of

the diversion problem.

 

· Physicians perceive the three main mechanisms of diversion

to be doctor shopping (when patients obtain controlled drugs from

multiple doctors) (96.4 percent), patient deception or manipulation of

doctors (87.8 percent), and forged or altered prescriptions (69.4

percent).

 

· Only 19.1 percent received any medical school training in

identifying prescription drug diversion; only 39.6 percent received

any training in medical school in identifying prescription drug abuse

and addiction.

 

 

Pharmacist Survey Highlights

 

· 28.4 percent do not regularly validate the prescribing

physician's DEA number when dispensing controlled drugs; one in 10

(10.5 percent) rarely or never do so.

 

· 61 percent do not regularly ask if the patient is taking any

other controlled drugs when dispensing a controlled medication; 25.8

percent rarely or never do so.

 

· When a patient presents a prescription for a controlled

drug, 26.5 percent " somewhat or very often " think it is for purposes

of diversion or abuse; 78.4 percent become " somewhat or very "

concerned about diversion or abuse when a patient asks for a

controlled drug by its brand name.

 

· 83.1 percent have refused to dispense a controlled drug in

the past year because of suspicions of diversion or abuse; 51.8

percent believe that patients account for the bulk of the diversion

problem.

 

· 28.9 percent have experienced a theft or robbery of

controlled drugs at their pharmacy within the last five years; 20.9

percent do not stock certain controlled drugs in order to prevent

diversion.

 

· Only about half received any training in identifying

prescription drug diversion (48.1 percent) or abuse or addiction (49.6

percent) since pharmacy school.

 

 

CASA surveyed 979 physicians and 1,030 pharmacists from July 21 to

October 31, 2004. The margin of error is +/-3%.

 

Read the Full Report

 

See also:

 

Prescription Drug Abuse Soars to 'Epidemic' Proportions

Posted July 8, 2005 4:42PM

" Today more people are abusing controlled prescription drugs than

the combined number who use cocaine, hallucinogens, amphetamines and

heroin, " Joseph A. Califano, president of the National Center on

Addiction and Drug Abuse at Columbia University, said at a news

conference Thursday.

 

15 million in U.S. abusing prescription drugs

Use of pain relievers like Oyxcontin triples among teens, report finds

 

 

 

posted by sepp on Saturday July 9 2005

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