PURDUE PHARMA GIVES POLICE FUNDS TO FIGHT ABUSE OF DRUG

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Since March, undercover deputies in Letcher County have
arrested more than two dozen suspected OxyContin abusers and dealers by
using hidden tape recorders to document stings.

Purdue Pharma, which manufacturers the pain drug, provided the money to buy
the machines, which cost $250 each - and a lot more.

The company has given Letcher County and seven other Kentucky police
agencies $10,000 each this year to fight illicit drugs. Five more grants
are pending.

"This money was like a blessing," said Letcher County Sheriff Danny Webb,
who had no such funds available when he took office in January.

For Purdue Pharma, the grants are part of an expensive program aimed at
repairing OxyContin's battered image.

As OxyContin became a favorite of narcotics abusers, many doctors in
Appalachia and other rural areas turned skittish about prescribing it, and
a number of patients shied away from taking it.

Purdue Pharma now is spending heavily - about $130million a year by its
measure - to help curb that illicit use and restore the drug's medical
reputation, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported yesterday.

About $100million is paying for research into a new formula for the drug
that would thwart abuse yet keep its pain-relief qualities, said Robin
Hogen, the company's vice president of public affairs.

Purdue Pharma is spending $6million on television and newspaper advertising
in Kentucky and six other states to rally the public against illegal pill use.

It donates seed money for grass-roots programs to fight drug abuse, and
provides doctors and pharmacists with tips on detecting abusers and
doctor-shoppers. Last year it spent $240,000 on free forgery-proof
prescription pads for doctors.

Cash donations to police agencies are "strategically focused on hot spots"
in Kentucky, Virginia and Ohio, said J. Aaron Graham, a former police
officer and federal drug agent whom Purdue Pharma hired as vice president
for corporate security about a year ago.

So far, sheriffs in Letcher, Harlan and Perry counties, and police in
Pikeville, Jackson, Pippa Passes, Georgetown and Cumberland, have collected
$10,000 checks, the company said. Purdue Pharma also donated to the
Kentucky State Police 1,000 brochures showing the size, shape and color of
pills that are often abused.

Graham said that with the extra money, police "could be more successful. If
they are, they can make OxyContin abuse go away. And that's what we want."

In Letcher County, Webb plans to buy tiny video cameras next. Most of the
rest of his grant will finance undercover drug buys.

OxyContin is one of his biggest problems, Webb said. It is also expensive
now that supplies have tightened. The strongest pills can cost $120 on the
street, up 50 percent from 2001.