To the Editor:
Re “Opioid Maker Hit With a Penalty of $572 Million” (front page, Aug. 27):
Yawn! This is an old story. Fines that do not cripple a guilty enterprise are nothing more than the cost of doing business. Johnson & Johnson (and Wall Street) are thrilled at the minimal amount. However, beyond fines, regardless of magnitude, what we really need is criminal prosecution of the executives who knowingly condone and/or order these despicable behaviors.
Ten years in a federal prison might — might — get someone’s attention.
MacKenzie Allen
Santa Fe, N.M.
To the Editor:
The judgment against Johnson & Johnson reportedly reflected what it would cost Oklahoma for a year’s worth of services needed to remediate the effects of the opioid epidemic.
Is there no countervailing vital benefit from the analgesia often only opioids can provide with severe pain? As David Leonhardt compellingly underscored, opioids can be “highly effective medications that make the difference between a functional and dysfunctional life” (“The Benefits of Opioids,” column, March 9, 2018).
Are we to simply ignore the Institute of Medicine’s 2011 national policy blueprint to redress appalling undertreatment of chronic pain? It concluded, “The majority of people with pain use their prescription drugs properly … and should not be stigmatized or denied access because of the misdeeds or carelessness of others.”
No concern here, either, for dangerously driving patients in pain toward the black market, self-medication, even heroin? How many severely suffering people are dead from being left to themselves to redress the excruciating pain they undeniably suffered?
Mark J. Headley
New York
To the Editor:
Re “Sacklers in Talks to Yield Control of Drug Company” (front page, Aug. 28):
It is fine to reach settlements with the companies that have produced opioids and are responsible for having a role in the crisis that has “killed hundreds of thousands of people in the past two decades,” but how did those victims obtain the drugs?
Perhaps some bought them as “street drugs,” but aren’t thousands of physicians who prescribed them at fault as well? Their voices remain largely silent in the debate.
J. Patrice Marandel
Los Angeles
Source: Read Full Article
Home » Analysis & Comment » Opinion | Faulting Drug Makers for the Opioid Crisis
Opinion | Faulting Drug Makers for the Opioid Crisis
To the Editor:
Re “Opioid Maker Hit With a Penalty of $572 Million” (front page, Aug. 27):
Yawn! This is an old story. Fines that do not cripple a guilty enterprise are nothing more than the cost of doing business. Johnson & Johnson (and Wall Street) are thrilled at the minimal amount. However, beyond fines, regardless of magnitude, what we really need is criminal prosecution of the executives who knowingly condone and/or order these despicable behaviors.
Ten years in a federal prison might — might — get someone’s attention.
MacKenzie Allen
Santa Fe, N.M.
To the Editor:
The judgment against Johnson & Johnson reportedly reflected what it would cost Oklahoma for a year’s worth of services needed to remediate the effects of the opioid epidemic.
Is there no countervailing vital benefit from the analgesia often only opioids can provide with severe pain? As David Leonhardt compellingly underscored, opioids can be “highly effective medications that make the difference between a functional and dysfunctional life” (“The Benefits of Opioids,” column, March 9, 2018).
Are we to simply ignore the Institute of Medicine’s 2011 national policy blueprint to redress appalling undertreatment of chronic pain? It concluded, “The majority of people with pain use their prescription drugs properly … and should not be stigmatized or denied access because of the misdeeds or carelessness of others.”
No concern here, either, for dangerously driving patients in pain toward the black market, self-medication, even heroin? How many severely suffering people are dead from being left to themselves to redress the excruciating pain they undeniably suffered?
Mark J. Headley
New York
To the Editor:
Re “Sacklers in Talks to Yield Control of Drug Company” (front page, Aug. 28):
It is fine to reach settlements with the companies that have produced opioids and are responsible for having a role in the crisis that has “killed hundreds of thousands of people in the past two decades,” but how did those victims obtain the drugs?
Perhaps some bought them as “street drugs,” but aren’t thousands of physicians who prescribed them at fault as well? Their voices remain largely silent in the debate.
J. Patrice Marandel
Los Angeles
Source: Read Full Article