"We all need to stick our noses into somebody else's business"

[crimethink]

Ohio Limits Opioid Prescriptions to Just Seven Days

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/americas-heroin-epidemic/ohio-limits-opioid-prescriptions-just-seven-days-n740531

The Ohio governor unveiled a plan Thursday that targets the place where experts say many opioid addictions begin — the doctor's office.

Gov. John Kasich's order limits the amount of opiates primary care physicians and dentists can prescribe to no more than seven days for adults and five days for minors.

In addition to the pill limits, Kasich said the new rules require doctors to provide a specific diagnosis and procedure code for every painkiller prescription they write.

And Kasich warned that doctors who don't follow the rules will lose their licenses.

"You're going to have to abide by these rules," he said.

The new limits, which have gotten the blessing of the Ohio Board of Pharmacy, the State Medical Board, and the state's dental and nursing boards, do not apply to patients who take prescription painkillers for cancer treatment or to dying patients who are already receiving hospice care, Kasich said.

"Health care providers can prescribe opiates in excess of the new limits only if they provide a specific reason in the patient's medical record," the state said in a statement.

Kasich also said lawmakers and doctors can't do it alone and that Ohioans are going to have to speak up when they see something if they want to vanquish this plague.

"We all need to stick our noses into somebody else's business," he said.

[madfranks]

"We all need to stick our noses into somebody else's business," he said. The worst kind of politician there is.

[crimethink]

The worst kind of politician there is.

Kasich has unbelievable candor.

[singular_me]

waiting for crime rate to skyrocket now

but hey, it is most likely meant to happen that way to accelerate martial law

[crimethink]

waiting for crime rate to skyrocket now

but hey, it is most likely meant to happen that way to accelerate martial law

Many on comment boards are saying those in chronic pain will, indeed, turn to heroin or something else "illegal." And the junkies will return to heroin.

[old steel]

Many on comment boards are saying those in chronic pain will, indeed, turn to heroin or something else "illegal." And the junkies will return to heroin.


That's why the marines are still over in Afghanistan, guarding the poppy fields for the CIA.

[Glass]

Somethings going on.


McCaskill Opens Probe Into Opioid Drugmakers, But Omits Nation's Worst Offender From Her Home State
U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill opened an investigation Tuesday into the role drug companies may have played in the nation’s opioid epidemic. She requested internal documents from five leading drugmakers on how they market opioid painkillers and if they knew anything about the dangers of the drugs. Yet, the top opioid prescription manufacturer, which is located in McCaskill’s home state is missing from the initial list of companies she’s investigating.



Zerohedge (http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-30/mccaskill-opens-probe-opioid-drugmakers-omits-nations-worst-offender-her-home-state)

This makes an interesting read:

Here Are "The Most Profitable Corporations You've Never Heard Of"

When I first started becoming aware of how sleazy, parasitic and corrupt the U.S. economy was, I only had expertise in one industry, financial services. Coming to grips with the blatant criminality of the TBTF Wall Street banks and their enablers at the Federal Reserve and throughout the federal government, I thought this was the main issue that needed to be confronted. What I’ve learned in the years since is pretty much every industry in America is corrupt to the core, more focused on sucking money away from helpless citizens via rent-seeking schemes versus actually producing a product and adding value. Unfortunately, the healthcare industry is no exception.
Today’s post zeros in on a particular slice of that industry. A group of companies known as Pharmacy Benefit Managers, or PBMs. Companies that seem to extract far more from the public than they give back. It’s a convoluted sector that is difficult to get your head around, which is why we should be thankful that David Dayen wrote an excellent piece on the topic recently. What follows are merely excerpts from his lengthy and highly informative piece, The Hidden Monopolies That Raise Drug Prices (http://prospect.org/article/hidden-monopolies-raise-drug-prices-0). I strongly suggest you read the entire thing.

Below are a few highlights from the piece published in The American Prospect (http://prospect.org/article/hidden-monopolies-raise-drug-prices-0):

Like any retail outlet, Frankil purchases inventory from a wholesale distributor and sells it to customers at a small markup. But unlike butchers or hardware store owners, pharmacists have no idea how much money they’ll make on a sale until the moment they sell it. That’s because the customer’s co-pay doesn’t cover the cost of the drug. Instead, a byzantine reimbursement process determines Frankil’s fee.

“I get a prescription, type in the data, click send, and I’m told I’m getting a dollar or two,” Frankil says. The system resembles the pull of a slot machine: Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. “Pharmacies sell prescriptions at significant losses,” he adds. “So what do I do? Fill the prescription and lose money, or don’t fill it and lose customers? These decisions happen every single day.”

Frankil’s troubles cannot be traced back to insurers or drug companies, the usual suspects that most people deem responsible for raising costs in the health-care system. He blames a collection of powerful corporations known as pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs. If you have drug coverage as part of your health plan, you are likely to carry a card with the name of a PBM on it. These middlemen manage prescription drug benefits for health plans, contracting with drug manufacturers and pharmacies in a multi-sided market. Over the past 30 years, PBMs have evolved from paper-pushers to significant controllers of the drug pricing system, a black box understood by almost no one. Lack of transparency, unjustifiable fees, and massive market consolidations have made PBMs among the most profitable corporations you’ve never heard about.

Americans pay the highest health-care prices in the world, including the highest for drugs, medical devices, and other health-care services and products. Our fragmented system produces many opportunities for excessive charges. But one lesser-known reason for those high prices is the stranglehold that a few giant intermediaries have secured over distribution. The antitrust laws are supposed to provide protection against just this kind of concentrated economic power. But in one area after another in today’s economy, federal antitrust authorities and the courts have failed to intervene. In this case, PBMs are sucking money out of the health-care system—and our wallets—with hardly any public awareness of what they are doing.

Even some Republicans criticize PBMs for pursuing profit at the public’s expense. “They show no interest in playing fair, no interest in the end user,” says Representative Doug Collins of Georgia, one of the industry’s loudest critics. “They act as monopolistic terrorists on this market.” Collins and a bipartisan group in Congress want to rein in the PBM industry, setting up a titanic battle between competing corporate interests. The question is whether President Donald Trump will join that effort to fulfill his frequent promises to bring down drug prices.



Here’s how it works…


http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-29/mike-krieger-introduces-most-profitable-corporations-youve-never-heard

It goes on to talk about the monopolizing scam. How these prescription clearing houses control which pharmaceuticals a pharmacy sell, how they block access to some medications like generics and "best" option brands because of rebate percentages i.e. profit margins for themselves. How pharmacies often sell at a loss or make a small margin which is clawed back months later in reverse rebates.

It's too much to post here. IT does touch on the opioid products specifically but by the time you get to that part you will pretty much understand the scam and what is going on.

The political action your post highlights will in some way be because of some demand made by one or all of the 3 companies described in this analysis.

[woodman]

Glass, I'm gonna thank you twice for that post. Fascinating.

[crimethink]

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-29/mike-krieger-introduces-most-profitable-corporations-youve-never-heard

It goes on to talk about the monopolizing scam. How these prescription clearing houses control which pharmaceuticals a pharmacy sell, how they block access to some medications like generics and "best" option brands because of rebate percentages i.e. profit margins for themselves. How pharmacies often sell at a loss or make a small margin which is clawed back months later in reverse rebates.

It's too much to post here. IT does touch on the opioid products specifically but by the time you get to that part you will pretty much understand the scam and what is going on.

The political action your post highlights will in some way be because of some demand made by one or all of the 3 companies described in this analysis.

Synthetic opiates are cheap, both to produce and to buy. A monthly bottle of, for example, Hydrocodone/APAP (generic Vicodin or Norco), is less than $50 full retail, without insurance or discount. No one is getting rich off them.

Pharma corporations make their killings off unnecessary shit like statins, and still-patented (brand name) chemicals that their field drug reps talk doctors into prescribing over equally-effective older, cheaper drugs. The fiasco with the anthrax back in 2001 illustrated it quite well: cheap penicillin was just as effective at killing anthrax, but Bayer's Cipro was ordered by the Federal regime to be used instead, at greatly increased cost.

Old Steel's comment is a more likely lead on motive.

[cheka.]

skype not happy. they've been enjoying bumper crop organ harvests with brain dead opi-heads

[Glass]

Old Steel's comment is a more likely lead on motive.

So are we saying that the opiates are being withheld from prescription - medical channels so that they can be sold on the black market like the opiates grown and imported from Afghanistan?

I don't think the Afghan crops make it to the pharmacy channels. I know, at least down here in Aus, specifically Tasmania, they have a thriving opium framing industry supplying PharmCo.

Farms in Tasmania produce about 50%[3] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tasmanian_opium_poppy_farming_industry#cite_note-ABC_Rural_-_7_November_2014_-_A_systemic_mildew_that.27s_causing_entire_paddock _losses_in_poppy_crops_across_Tasmania_has_sparked _an_industry-wide_response-3) of the world's licit poppy straw (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poppy_straw) that is later refined into opiates (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opiate) such as morphine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphine) and codeine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codeine).[4] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tasmanian_opium_poppy_farming_industry#cite_note-The_Sydney_Morning_Herald_-_14_January_2014_-_Opium_poppy_venture_on_a_high-4)

It could be some part of the other 50% comes from places like afghanistan but I didn't think it did.

[brosil]

Heroin is down to $5 a hit in my part of Ohio. I suppose the quality sucks but availability is good. I strongly reccomend the book Chasing The Scream, The beginning and end of the drug war by Johann Hari . It has some good ideas on treatment as well as a history of how we got hear.

[Celtic Rogue]

This legislation is short sighted! This will only drive people to the Mexican heroin that is getting over the borders more and ,more each year! They are in a sense creating and enabling a thriving black market both in out of state opioids, cheap heroin and chines analogs like fentanyl! Fentanyl is the real reason for the up ticks in overdoses!


The emergence of decentralized drug labs using materials obtained from China — and often ordered over the Internet — makes it more difficult to combat the illicit use of the drug.
“We had a spike in 2007” of fentanyl-related deaths, said Russell Baer, a spokesman for the federal Drug Enforcement Administration. “We traced it to a single production lab in Mexico and the deaths went away. Now, it is not restricted to one site.”
Fentanyl is legally used to treat people with severe pain, often after surgery, but this prescription fentanyl is not the source of most of the illegal trade.


https://www.statnews.com/2016/04/05/fentanyl-traced-to-china/