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Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Wednesday, August 28, 2019 Charges Filed Against Dozens in Trafficking Network Responsible for Diverting Over 23 Million Oxycodone, Hydrocodone and Carisoprodol Pills DEA Also Takes Administrative Action and Immediately Suspends Seven Pharmacies and Two Providers; DOJ Announces Expansion of Health Care Fraud Strike Force into Rio Grande Valley and San Antonio A total of 41 individuals have been charged in nine indictments for their alleged involvement in a network of “pill mill” clinics and pharmacies.  Those charged include medical providers, clinic owners and managers, pharmacists, pharmacy owners and managers...

In just 10 months, the sixth-largest company in America shipped more than 3 million prescription opioids — nearly 10,000 pills a day on average — to a single pharmacy in a Southern West Virginia town with only 400 residents, according to a congressional report released Wednesday. McKesson Corp. supplied “massive quantities” of the painkiller hydrocodone to the now-shuttered Sav-Rite Pharmacy in Kermit, even after an employee at the company’s Ohio drug warehouse flagged the suspect pill orders in 2007, the report found. That year, McKesson — ranked 6th in the Fortune 500 — reviewed its customers, including Sav-Rite, and reported...

Stricter rules for the country's most commonly prescribed painkiller were rolled out on Thursday by the FDA, the last step in a policy change that has been coming down the pipeline for years, The New York Times reported on Sunday. Hydrocodone will now be in a more serious and restrictive category. Doctors will be barred from calling in prescriptions by telephone, and patients will not be able to get refills on the same prescription, but will have to return to a physician for a new one. It will also have be to kept in special vaults in pharmacies. The Drug...

A Texas teenager whose date died in their hotel room after her senior prom has sent a series of emotional text messages to a friend suggesting she passed away following an overdose. The unidentified date frantically called 911 on Saturday morning after waking up in a North Houston Hyatt to find that 17-year-old Jacqueline Gomez was not breathing. Investigators said that the MacArthur High School senior showed no outward signs of injury and the results of her autopsy are pending. They added that her boyfriend is not suspected of any crime. Now text messages that he sent to one of...

The Food and Drug Administration is recommending new restrictions on prescription medicines containing hydrocodone, the highly addictive painkiller that has grown into the most widely prescribed drug in the U.S. In a major policy shift, the agency said in an online notice Thursday that hydrocodone-containing drugs should be subject to the same restrictions as other narcotic drugs like oxycodone and morphine.

Three tribes lead the best practice initiative treating the epidemic of painkiller addiction in Native America, Oklahoma, the nation's leader in painkiller addiction. Treating all adults, Medicaid. Last month the Center for Disease Control called prescription painkiller addiction an epidemic in the country, identifying Oklahoma as leading the nation in both the addiction and related deaths. It is only fitting that the battle against such addiction in "Native America" be led by three tribal owned clinics, Absentee Shawnee Counseling Services, OKC; Keetoowah Cherokee Treatment Services, Tulsa; and Quapaw Counseling Services, Miami. Generally speaking, prescription painkillers are opiates. There are 14...

We are facing a tsunami of painkiller addiction that will flood our criminal justice, health care, behavioral health, and social services resources. Illicit online pharmacies have made prescriptions cheap and easy to acquire, fueling a massive wave of addi...ction that we actually have not seen yet. SAMHSA estimates that over 5% of the nations population, 12 years and older, are using painkillers, nowhere more prevalent than the heartland with Oklahoma leading the nation at 6.7%. Opioid addiction used to be thought of as primarily heroin addiction, but that is changing rapidly. The masses currently addicted to prescription painkillers have conveniently...

Exponential growth in addiction met with a dramatic reduction in supply, creates a situation where a large number of people get sick and desperate. Prices spike as addicts clamor to find the drugs they need so badly. Alternative, and often illegal, methods for raising funds are employed. Progressively risky behavior and criminal associations occur. People lose jobs, lose housing, and lose families, dismantling a network of support systems that are challenging, if not impossible, to rebuild. The magnitude of people potentially involved will send shockwaves through the criminal justice, social services, health care, and criminal justice service delivery systems as...

SAMHSA announced in March 2008 that Oklahoma topped the nation in prescription painkiller addiction. Effective law enforcement strategies by the DEA and the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs have abruptly shut down many of the online pharmacies, loose physician prescription practices, and multiple doctor sourcing. The result is a dramatic reduction in supply. The huge growth in painkiller addiction fueled by cheap and easy supply is being faced with a shutdown in supply. The result will be a sudden overwhelming number of sick and desperate people. Before we become too judgmental of such people, let us not forget...

<p>WASHINGTON - The federal government is considering tightening restrictions on narcotic pain relievers containing hydrocodone, a move that would greatly complicate pain relief therapy for millions of Americans.</p> <p>Literally the opioid of the masses, medications containing hydrocodone - - Vicodin, Lortab, Norco and many others - were prescribed by doctors more than 100 million times last year, more than any other prescription drug. Opioids are synthetic forms of opiates.</p>