Confronting prescription drug abuse
Prescription drug abuse is perhaps the most overlooked addiction problem in America today. According to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, prescription painkillers now rank as the nation’s second-most popular drug, behind marijuana. Nonetheless, prescription drug abuse does not garner nearly as much public attention as drugs like cocaine or heroin. Yet tackling prescription drug abuse will require special attention from policymakers, as methods of preventing illegal access to prescription drugs are completely different from other substances. Efforts by some states to make prescription forgery more difficult, and to vigorously pursue forgers are laying groundwork that, if replicated elsewhere and coupled with greater public awareness, could help reverse the increase in prescription drug abuse.
Recognition and Rehabilitation
Unlike other illicit drugs, often seen as the exclusive purview of the young and those on the social margin, prescription drugs are abused across all segments of the population and are more prevalent in the middle and upper classes. The issue therefore needs to be publicized in all communities, not just those with traditional drug abusers. Otherwise, those addicts who do not fit the stereotype will continue to go unnoticed.
When addiction is discovered, rehabilitation is the next step. “The rehabilitation for prescription drugs is nearly identical to that of alcohol and drugs,” Dr. Jerry Fitz, a physician at CRC Health in Tuscon, Ariz., told the HPR. Just as with alcohol and other drugs, rehabilitation costs and accessibility are major concerns for the families of prescription drug abusers. As Fitz explained, “If you have insurance or money, then you will be able to get into treatment immediately. Without money, or public assistance, [it takes a] long time to get treatment.”
Addicts who don’t seek help can suffer disastrous consequences. In the case of prescription drug abuse, college-age adults seem particularly at-risk, as they often have no family present to insist on rehabilitation. As a result, Fitz stated, “One of the highest age groups for drug use mortality is the teenager/young adult with prescription opiates. Opiates are used in combination with other drugs, such as alcohol, so we see a lot of students who overdose and die in this age group.”
“A Kind of Source”
Students are particularly at risk because school environments make it easier to illegally acquire prescription drugs. According to professor Mark Kleiman, Director of UCLA’s Drug Policy Analysis Program, not much violence or organized crime stems from the prescription drug trade. However, as he informed the HPR, “You do see [prescription drugs] traded around schoolyards. Some people get their friends to fill prescriptions for them, while others make photocopies of prescriptions and get them filled at different pharmacies or they used scammed prescriptions.” Indeed, these acquisition methods are why prescription drugs cannot easily be compared to other drugs. As Kleiman explained, “Prescription drugs are not a kind of drug, they are a kind of source.”
Fighting Forgeries
Attempts to eliminate the sources of prescription drugs vary across state lines. For example, Kleiman noted that district attorneys in California have made an effort to prosecute doctors and pharmacists who write too many prescriptions or who blatantly write false ones. On the other hand, he pointed out, “In Kentucky, it is legal for a doctor to write a prescription for a patient he has never seen, based on online contact. Online sites that sell prescription drugs are uncertain territory and a lot of these Internet sites have doctors in places like Kentucky.”
To combat forgeries, district attorneys in many states have begun to strictly enforce laws preventing pharmacists from filling faulty prescriptions. At times, these rules can make it more difficult for people with genuine prescriptions to receive their medication. Luckily, some new monitoring techniques are proving quite effective. One example is multi-part prescription forms, whereby the pharmacist keeps one part and turns another part in to a state agency, thus preventing multiple prescription refills.
If states can share this sort of simple innovation, forgery will become far more difficult. Yet challenges like suspicious Internet operations and unscrupulous doctors remain to be addressed, so prescription drug abuse will certainly not disappear. For this reason, public education about the problem must accompany efforts at better law enforcement, and the two strategies in tandem represent the best hope for reducing prescription drug abuse.