At the ceremony of promulgation of the new law, Governor Rick Scott lamented the ease in buying highly addictive drugs such as Oxycocodone in the state.
According to a report by the Florida Medical Examiners Association, about seven people died per day in Florida victims of overdose of painkillers, between January 2009 and June 2010. The number exceeds that of cocaine overdose deaths in Florida today, and even the figures related to the crack epidemic in the 1980s, and heroin in the 1970s, according to the association.
According to the association of relatives of victims StoppNow only in South Florida (which holds a population of 5 million) there are 183 clinics dedicated to treating pain and prescription painkillers. Throughout the state are 900 centers.
Health officials believe that the State of Florida lives an epidemic and speak in an industry behind the deliberate sale of opium-based drugs. In Broward County, for example, there are more clinics for treating pain than McDonald's stores.
One focus of the campaign against overdose of painkillers is the drug Oxycodone. The Florida Medical Examiners report cites the sale of 400 million tablets per year, mostly for drug addicts.
The medical and public health expert said Elmer Huerta Oxycodone "is one of the most abused drug in the United States. When you take, feel like you're in another world, a state of indifference."
The StoppNow also says that thousands of Americans travel each year to Florida in order to get prescriptions for painkillers.
In April this year, the Obama administration launched a national plan to control the abuse of drugs. One measure of the plan is to alert physicians to reduce the prescription of painkillers with high power of addiction.
Understand why analgesics so addictive
The opium analgesics produce a short-term euphoria, but they are also addictive.
The use of painkillers in the long term can lead to physical dependence. The body adjusts to the presence of the substance and one stop taking the drug abruptly, withdrawal symptoms occur. Or the body can build up a tolerance for the drug, which means that will be needed at higher doses to achieve the same effects.
Like all drugs, painkillers simply mask the pain. Do not "cure" anything. Someone who continually tries to alleviate the pain may find themselves taking increasingly higher doses - up to discover that he can not get through the day without the drug.
Withdrawal symptoms may include restlessness, muscle and bone pain, insomnia, diarrhea, vomiting, chills (known as "Turkish Fever") and involuntary movements of the legs.
One of the serious risks of opioids is respiratory impairment - high doses can weaken to the point to stop breathing and die consumer.
OxyContin: The "HILLBILLY Heroin"
By react on the nervous system the same way as heroin or opium, some addicts are using OxyContin, a type of painkiller oxycodone, as a substitute or supplement to opiates like heroin street.
There were armed robberies of pharmacies where the robber demands, not money, but only OxyContin.
In some areas, particularly in the eastern U.S., OxyContin has been the drug of interest relevant authorities.
The OxyContin, widely known as "hillbilly heroin" because of its abuse in communities Apaches, has emerged as one of the biggest crime problems in the U.S.. In one county, it was estimated that the addiction to this drug was behind 80% of crimes.
Mental and physiological effects of analgesics
- Constipation
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Dizziness
- Confusion
- Addition
- Unconsciousness
- Respiratory failure
- Increased risk of heart attack
- Coma
- Death
International statistics
Among those who used illicit drugs for the first time in 2007, marijuana and prescription painkillers were the most popular - each used by almost the same number of Americans in the age of 12 onwards. Increased by 12% the use of analgesics without medical advice.
One in 10 students from high school in the U.S. admits to abusing prescription painkillers. Misuse of painkillers represents three quarters of the total problem of abuse of prescription drugs. In the U.S. the painkiller hydrocodone is more controlled pharmaceutical product that is diverse and commonly used abusively.
Methadone was once used in addiction treatment centers and is now used by doctors as a painkiller, was identified as the cause of 785 deaths in one state, Florida, in 2007.
The abuse of prescription drugs is also climbing among older Americans, especially involving anxiolytics such as Xanax and painkillers such as OxyContin.
In the UK, tens of thousands of people are considered as dependent on painkillers and Solpadeina Neurofen Plus.
Doctors and rehabilitation therapists report that the abuse of prescription painkillers is one of the most difficult addictions treatment.
The truth about drugs
Drugs are essentially poisons. The quantity determines the effect. A small amount is a stimulant (speeds you).
A larger amount acts as a sedative (it slows down). An even larger amount acts as a poison and can kill a person.
This is true for any drug. Only varies the amount necessary to achieve the desired effect.
But many drugs have another dependency: they directly affect the mind. They can distort the consumer's perception of what is ocorendo around. As a result, the person's actions can be strange, irrational, inappropriate and even destructive.
The drugs block all sensations, the sensations so desirable and the undesirable. Therefore, while providing short-term help in relieving pain, also destroy the ability and alertness and obscure pensatividade.
The drugs are drugs that are intended to speed up or slow down or change something about the way your body works, try to make it work better. Sometimes they are needed. But they are still drugs: they act as stimulants or sedatives, and too much can kill you. So if you do not take medication as they should be used, they can be as dangerous as illegal drugs., And high power of addiction.
More doctors are judged by the U.S. abuse of prescription drugs
The doctor of Michael Jackson, accused of having caused the death of the singer with a powerful anesthetic, includes a small but growing number of doctors facing criminal charges in court because of the U.S. government to be curbing the excess of drug proceeds addictive.
Fatal overdoses of prescription painkillers more than tripled in the United States from 1999 to 2006, rising to 13,800, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Consequently, more doctors are in the crosshairs of prosecutors as states like Florida and Georgia face the increasing abuse of prescription drugs. Edit doctors is seen as more efficient than suing their patients.
There were more than two dozen criminal cases against physicians reported for malpractice in the two decades from 1981 through 2001, according to research by James Filkins, doctor and lawyer who wrote about the prosecution of the category.
Replicating the research Filkins, joined Reuters 37 criminal cases in the decade from 2001 to 2011, the most recent against doctors who prescribed painkillers in an exaggerated way and other controlled substances. The agency that takes care of the drugs in the U.S., the DEA, suggests a similar trend. In 2003 she reported the arrest of 15 doctors, which resulted in convictions. In 2008, the latest year with data, the number had jumped to 43.
Medical malpractice cases are usually handled in civilian courts, where the victim or relatives of victims seeking compensation of physicians. In the case of Jackson doctor, Conrad Murray, prosecutors contend that their negligence was such that he should be guilty of involuntary manslaughter and punishable by imprisonment.