Grace Bisch, whose stepson died as a result of an overdose, protests outside the Supreme Court in December 2023.
Michael A. McCoy/The Washington Post via Getty Images
The company helped spur a public health crisis through its deceptive marketing and aggressive sales of prescription opioids.
Approaching the opioid crisis from a public health perspective includes massively increasing access to care and treatment for patients experiencing substance use disorder.
(Shutterstock)
There were more than 100,000 opioid-related deaths in North America in 2022. How the crisis grew to such proportions, and three potential paths to ending it.
Many companies have sold dangerous prescription drugs.
Peter Dazeley/The Image Bank via Getty Images
Making them pay is important but it’s not going to stop drugmakers from endangering public health.
OxyContin, an opioid drug heavily marketed by Purdue Pharma, is associated with billions of dollars of health-care costs in Canada related to the opioid crisis.
(AP Photo/Toby Talbot)
The Purdue Pharma settlement is paltry compared to costs of the opioid crisis. Without major changes to pharma industry regulation, there is little reason to think a similar crisis won’t occur again.
Dr. Laura Kehoe gives a presentation about why emergency room physicians should prescribe buprenorphine for people recovering from opioid overdoses.
Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
After battling drug manufacturers and distributors in court for years, local and state governments are about to receive a windfall that could expand access to treatments that can save lives.
People around the world mourned loved ones on International Overdose Awareness Day on Aug. 31, 2021.
NurPhoto/Getty Images
The multibillion-dollar settlement will trigger the release of troves of documents that may shine new light on what caused the opioid crisis.
Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey A. Rosen announced a settlement between the Justice Department and opioid maker Purdue on Oct. 21.
Yuri Gripas/Pool via AP
While critics accuse companies facing lots of lawsuits of using bankruptcy as a sort of ‘get of jail free card,’ the reality of the legal procedure is more complicated.
A man walks in a back alley in Vancouver’s downtown eastside, February 2019. More people fatally overdosed in British Columbia last year compared with 2017 despite efforts to combat the province’s public health emergency.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward
A policy response focused on reducing prescription opioids will not resolve North America’s opioid crisis. And it is hurting many adults who live with otherwise unbearable chronic pain.
Lawsuits against Purdue say its drug Oxycontin played a key role in the opioid epidemic.
Reuters/George Fre
OxyContin maker Purdue has reportedly been mulling a bankruptcy filling, just as the first of around 2,000 lawsuits against it prepares to go to trial.
What is each partner looking to get?
Africa Studio/Shutterstock.com
The interests of pharmaceutical companies and public health are not the same. Industry dollars can distort research agendas, while framing health challenges and solutions in ways that benefit corporations.
Classified advertisement for Leslie Keeley’s Gold Cure.
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Chicago Tribune, July 21, 1884
Jonathan S. Jones, Binghamton University, State University of New York
Considered in historical context, Purdue’s plan to peddle opioid addiction medicines to vulnerable people is not so surprising. Gilded-Age pharmaceutical companies used similar strategies.
Assistant Professor, Dept of Medicine, University of British Columbia and Research Scientist with the BC Centre on Substance Use, University of British Columbia