Rally Near White House Highlights Opioid Deaths
Families whose lives have been destroyed by fentanyl rallied near the White House Saturday to draw attention to the ongoing opioid crisis, the Washington Post reports. Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports drugmaker Endo is blamed for Tennessee's opioid crisis.
The Washington Post:
Families Destroyed By Fentanyl Deaths Rally Near The White House
April Babcock and Virginia Krieger both lost children to the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl and have pleaded with lawmakers and officials to ramp up enforcement along the U.S.-Mexico border to stop the flow of illicit drugs. On Saturday, the mothers built a kind of wall. Fifty banners stretched for about 400 feet, nearly spanning the width of the National Mall. They featured faces of nearly 3,500 people who lost their lives to fentanyl. Many were young, even teenagers. Some wore their high school jerseys or graduation caps. They smiled, forever frozen in time on the banners, which Babcock said represented the thousands of people who have died of opioid use. (Kornfield, 9/18)
Philadelphia Inquirer:
Endo, A Chester County Drug Maker, Blamed For Tennessee’s Opioid Crisis
Knoxville, a city of about 190,000 people on the Tennessee River with a state university and downtown entertainment district, was a huge market for Endo International’s addictive opioid pain pills. Almost 1 million more of Endo’s Opana ER tablets were sold in the Knoxville area between 2007 and 2014 than in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago combined. (Fernandez, 9/16)
Indianapolis Star:
Overdoses Are Marion County Coroner's Office Leading Cause Of Death
In its annual report examining trends among the decedents it takes in, the Marion County Coroner's Office recorded 799 people last year died from accidental drug intoxication. The alarming statistics surpassed the number of people examined by the office who died from heart disease − long at the top of the list − blunt force trauma and firearms for the second year in a row. (Nelson, 9/19)
Los Angeles Times:
Student Fentanyl Pill Overdose Death On Campus Spurs Action
Melanie Ramos, a 15-year-old student who died of a drug overdose this week at Helen Bernstein High School in Hollywood, loved to travel, dreamed of one day joining the Army and was best friends with her sisters. “Full of life,” is how a family member described her — and as far as they knew, Melanie did not use drugs. (Blume, Lin and Winton, 9/17)
AP:
Recovering Addicts Work To Help Others In 'Project Recover'
Joy Bogese is one of four peer recovery specialists who have been working in central Virginia this year as part of “Project Recover.” The specialists are embedded with ambulance crews and police officers so they can offer guidance and resources to victims during one of the most difficult times of their lives — immediately following an overdose. (Lavoie, 9/17)
In legal news —
Reuters:
Teva Expects To Start Paying U.S. Opioid Settlement In 2023
Teva Pharmaceutical Industries (TEVA.TA) expects to finalize an opioid settlement in the United States by year-end and start paying in 2023, its chief executive said on Sunday, while confirming he was unlikely to renew his contract next year. (9/19)
KHN:
Doctors Rush To Use Supreme Court Ruling To Escape Opioid Charges
Dr. Nelson Onaro conceded last summer that he’d written illegal prescriptions, although he said he was thinking only of his patients. From a tiny, brick clinic in Oklahoma, he doled out hundreds of opioid pills and dozens of fentanyl patches with no legitimate medical purpose. “Those medications were prescribed to help my patients, from my own point of view,” Onaro said in court, as he reluctantly pleaded guilty to six counts of drug dealing. Because he confessed, the doctor was likely to get a reduced sentence of three years or less in prison. (Kelman, 9/19)
