Four Million Americans Abused Prescription Drugs in 1999, National Institute on Drug Abuse Finds

Four million Americans abused prescription drugs in 1999, and two million of them used prescription medications for nonmedical purposes for the first time that year, a new report from the NIH's National Institute on Drug Abuse says. NIDA Director Alan Leshner said these figures illustrate that the problem is "growing." According to the report, the elderly, women and adolescents are most likely to abuse prescription medications. For example, 17% of Americans age 60 and older are affected by prescription drug abuse, mostly because that age group uses three times more of the medications than do younger people, Leshner said. Women, who are two to three times as likely to be prescribed medications than men, are about two times as likely to become addicted (Recer, AP/Owensboro Messenger-Inquirer, 4/11). In the report, Leshner says that NIDA prepared the paper to "answer questions about the consequences of abusing commonly prescribed medications" and to "help health care providers discuss the consequences of prescription drug abuse with their patients." He notes, "Prescription drug abuse is not a new problem, but one that deserves renewed attention" (NIDA, "Prescription Drugs: Abuse and Addiction," April 2001).

Slipping into an Addiction Cycle
During a news conference yesterday, addiction experts said that many people taking sedatives, stimulants, tranquilizers, pain killers or opiods "can slip into an addiction cycle that dominates their lives and damages their health," the AP/Messenger-Inquirer reports. This cycle can occur after patients begin to use the medications inappropriately, such as using pain-relievers "far longer than needed" or mixing sedatives with alcohol or other drugs. Ritalin is one prescription drug that has become a "frequently abused stimulant," particularly in Baltimore, Boston, Detroit, Minneapolis, Phoenix and Texas, the report says. According to the report, this increased abuse of prescription medications has coincided with a "rapidly rising trend in legitimate use of" some medications. For example, between 1990 and 1998, new users of pain relievers rose 181%, new users of tranquilizers increased 132%, new users of sedatives went up by 90% and new users of stimulants rose by 165%, NIDA said. Leshner said that NIDA and seven groups representing the elderly, pharmacies, drug manufacturers and consumers would begin a campaign to combat prescription drug abuse (AP/Owensboro Messenger-Inquirer, 4/11). The report is available at http://www.nida.nih.gov/ResearchReports/Prescription/Prescription.html