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?
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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.
The Chronic Pain Association of Canada has received money from Eli Lilly Canada Inc., Purdue Canada Inc. and Merck Frosst Canada. A blog post on the association’s website contains messages favourable to increased opioid use.
(Flickr/Ajay Suresh)
For many who know someone who has lost a loved one, it can be hard to know what to say or how to respond. For those who have lost a loved one, the silence can be deafening. Some things to keep in mind.
Cannabis seedlings are shown at the new Aurora Cannabis facility, November 24, 2017 in Montréal.
(THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz)
Research shows that THC and CBD in cannabis have potential to interrupt the vicious cycle of opioid addiction, dependence, withdrawal and relapse.
Few medical schools offer training in addictions medicine and most doctors feel they lack the specialist expertise to deal with the inpatient opioid crisis.
(THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan)
The toll of the opioid epidemic is often derived from toxicology reports. These rely on drug tests. A medical historian explains these tests and how they fall short of capturing why people are dying.
Many people may misunderstand the basics about opioids. That prevents researchers from understanding the full scope of the epidemic.
A few woefully underfunded academic health sciences centres are responsible for providing complex care to patients with life-threatening illnesses as well as training future doctors and testing the latest in new surgical techniques.
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Canada’s systems of health funding, medical training and physician compensation need an overhaul – to support vital centres of medical research and complex care.
U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams demonstrates the proper procedure for administering a nasal injection of naloxone on reporter Jennifer Lott, left, during a visit to the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, Miss., May 17, 2018.
AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis
Cyrus Ahalt, University of California, San Francisco
One study argues that naloxone increases opioid use because it protects against death from overdose. But a closer analysis shows Narcan is the number one public health tool to fight the overdose epidemic.
The way opioids work on the brain makes finding non-opioid treatments for addiction very challenging.
AP Photo/Ted S. Warren
Universities teach students and produce research – but do they have responsibility to engage with the communities that surround them? Two university presidents explain why their answer is an emphatic yes.
The U.S. has the highest daily opioid use rate in the world.
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Most countries need to find a happy balance between the American attitude that all pain needs to be cured – and the ethos in other countries that pain is to be endured.
As doctors have learned more about the types of pain, they can better tailor treatment.
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As knowledge of pain and the highly addictive nature of opioids has grown, so has the knowledge grown about pain and its origins. A pain specialist explains the intricacies, and how treatment is changing as a result.
Pain of the sick: ‘Anatomy of Expression,’ by Sir Charles Bell, 1806.
Wellcome Collection
In today’s opioid crisis, why are some people with addictions treated with empathy and others with disdain? The answer to that question has roots in the 19th century.
Paramedics and firefighters in Cincinnati respond to a possible opioid overdose at a hotel on Nov. 2, 2017.
John Minchillo/AP Photo
Deaths from opioid overdose and suicide are at an all-time high. One in 10 adult Americans uses marijuana. And only 1 in 3 Americans self-describes as ‘happy.’ A public health expert asks, what’s going on?
‘Confessions of an English Opium-Eater’ was the first modern drug memoir and set the tone for opium use for decades. Here: Papaver somniferum (Opium poppy), a group of deep red flowers, buds and seed pods. Opium is extracted from the latex of the unripe seed pods. Ripe seeds are innocuous and widely used in baking.
(Rowan McOnegal/Wellcome Collection)
‘Confessions of an English Opium-Eater’ is considered the first modern drug memoir. Many believe it is responsible for our romantic ideas of opium-based drug use today.
Every patient is different.
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Scientists are just starting to understand how your parents’ genes and experiences might shape your own susceptibility to dangerous drugs. Could that help to stop addictions before they start?
Evidence from countries that execute people for drug offenses shows no relationship between harsh punishment and rates of drug use.
Ezra Acayan/Reuters
Just seven countries worldwide regularly execute people for drug crimes, most of them authoritarian regimes. Nothing suggests that this brutal policy actually curbs drug use.