prescribing opioids for chronic pain. One of the authors of the article, Dr. David Juurlink from the University of Toronto, found that the citations failed to note that the people being prescribed opioids were there for a short period of time.
Juurlink and the other medical professionals who sent the new letter to the journal stated in the article that they believe the citations and misrepresentations contributed to the opioid crisis in North America by “helping to shape a narrative that allayed prescribers‘ concerns about the risk of addiction associated with long-term opioid therapy.”
The recent article also points out that those citations of the paragraph-letter spiked after OxyContin, a powerful narcotic painkiller, was introduced in the 1990s.
Not much happened when the original letter was published in 1980, but after companies began producing and selling new drugs and providing incentives for doctors to prescribe those highly addictive and powerful drugs.
Author: Ryan Beitler
An editor and contributor to Addiction Now, Ryan Beitler is a journalist, fiction writer, musician, and travel writer. He has written for Paste Magazine, OC Weekly, numerous addiction recovery publications, and his travel blog Our Little Blue Rock. He lives in Southern California. Contact Ryan at ryanrbeitler@gmail.com or ryanb@addictionnow.com.
