MERCOLA: The AMA’s Contribution to the Opioid Epidemic

As detailed in a Mother Jones exposé, the AMA has a long, cozy relationship with Big Pharma, including Purdue Pharma The AMA’s pain management training program for physicians implied that doctors were too tentative to give patients these pills and “the effectiveness of opioid therapy may be undermined by misconceptions about their risks” The AMA’s pain management training program was developed by a team with close ties to the industry Purdue Pharma gave more than $3 million in donations to the AMA and the AMA Foundation from 2002 to 2018 Richard Sackler, who served as the president of Purdue Pharma, was a member of the AMA Foundation’s board of directors from 1998 to 2004 While being dependent on prots from commercial endeavors and receiving heavy funding from Big Pharma, the AMA functions as a trade group while portraying itself as independent In October 2020, opioid manufacturer Purdue Pharma pleaded guilty to three felony counts of criminal wrongdoing and agreed to an $8.3 billion settlement with the Department of Justice over their production and marketing of Oxycontin and other opioid drugs.1 - "The abuse and diversion of prescription opioids has contributed to a national tragedy of addiction and deaths, in addition to those caused by illicit street opioids," said Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey A. Rosen in a news release.2 In 2019, opioid overdoses were responsible for nearly 50,000 deaths in the U.S., with the misuse of and addiction to opioids described as a national crisis.3 The pandemic has only worsened the crisis. From December 2019 to December 2020, there were 93,331 estimated overdose deaths in the U.S., which represents a 29.4% increase in 12 months.4Opioids, including oxycodone, hydrocodone, and morphine, accounted for the majority of deaths — 69,031 — followed by synthetic opioids, such as fentanyl and tramadol.5 The most recent data on opioid overdose deaths can be viewed via the CDC’s 12-month provisional number of drug overdose deaths by drug or drug class dashboard — due to a small percentage still pending investigation, numbers may change slightly upon final analysis.6 On their website, the American Medical Association (AMA), whose mission is to "promote the art and science of medicine and the betterment of public health, "7 states that its Opioid Task Force is "committed to providing evidence-based recommendations and leadership to help end the opioid epidemic."8 However, as detailed in a Mother Jones exposé, AMA has a long, cozy relationship with Big Pharma, including Purdue Pharma. "The prestigious doctor's group has made it virtually impossible to discern where public health guidance ends and industry interests begin," writer Julia Lurie writes in Mother Jones.9 'How to Create an Addict Education' In 2007, Purdue Pharma pleaded guilty to felony charges of misbranding with intent to defraud and mislead the public and physicians about Oxycontin's dangers. Several months later, the AMA released their new pain management training program, which included 12 modules about prescribing narcotics, including that doctors were too tentative to give patients these pills and "the effectiveness of opioid therapy may be undermined by misconceptions about their risks, particularly risks associated with abuse and addiction."10 FOR THE WHOLE POST CLICK HERE .https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Wkz4iamSe0m2oY-WVKI5ljCcRd0fp_SVR0te2Gz4dFc/edit?usp=sharing Support the show