The Crime Report (https://thecrimereport.org/category/drugs/)
In 2009, New York State finally abandoned one of the toughest drug laws in the nation. But according to one of the individuals trapped by the Rockefeller Drug Laws, the country still has a long way to go before ending its punitive approach.
Dozens of medical professionals in five states were charged Wednesday with illegally prescribing more than 32 million pain pills, including doctors who prosecutors said traded sex for prescriptions and a dentist who unnecessarily pulled teeth from patients to justify giving them opioids.
Kratom increasingly is being used by those who swear by it as a curb for opioid addiction. Several million Americans are now believed to use kratom. In almost all of the 91 fatalities involving kratom, other drugs were present.
In addition to a stronger attack on drug traffickers and unscrupulous doctors, officials vowed to help more addicts with education, housing, and jobs rather than sending them to jail.
Many in the Bible Belt had opposed tools like needle exchanges and naloxone distribution to help drug addicts. With opioid overdose deaths surging nationwide, attitudes in the South have shifted.
Barr called the current marijuana situation in the U.S. “intolerable” and said the Justice Department is currently reviewing the recently reintroduced STATES Act, which would shield people complying with state marijuana laws from federal intervention.
The U.S. charged British firm Indivior with felony fraud and conspiracy for its marketing of opioid products, including Suboxone. The company allegedly created a “nationwide scheme” in the U.S. designed to convince doctors and government insurance providers that their patented opioid medications are safer and less prone to abuse than cheaper generic alternatives.
A week after winning a $270 million settlement against Purdue Pharma, Oklahoma is dropping a laundry list of civil claims against drug firms at the center of the national opioid epidemic. Attorney General Mike Hunter said the move would “refocus” the case slated to go to trial May 28.
The nonprofit Safehouse contests a Justice Department lawsuit contending that the first U.S. supervised drug consumption facility would violate federal law. The lawsuit may prove to be a national test case.
Many U.S. jurisdictions have addressed opoid addiction through the justice system. But Indiana’s Hamilton County has begun a different approach, using quick response teams of first responders and “recovery specialists.”