DANGER IN A PILL BOTTLE

Ottawa Citizen Somehow, a drug looks less threatening when it's in a
white bottle with a drugstore label, than when it's being snorted or
injected by a strung-out addict on the street.

But oxycodone is the same substance, whether the pill is swallowed as
directed on those labels, or whether it's crushed into the powder that
addicts use. Oxycodone is an addictive opiate, like heroin. It's found
in prescription painkillers, such as Percocet and OxyContin. OxyContin
pills are formulated to release the dose over about 12 hours, but when
the pill is crushed and snorted or injected, the hit comes faster. And
that's dangerous.

The Ontario coroner's office is hoping to examine its potentially
fatal effects soon. The Toronto Star recently reported an estimated
464 people died from oxycodone overdoses in Ontario over the past five
years. Overdoses of this drug account for far more deaths than heroin
in Ontario, and nearly as many as cocaine.

In contrast, there has never been a fatal marijuana overdose. Yet the
global resources put into cannabis eradication are staggering.

Oxycodone is a far more serious problem. But what to do about
it?

The first step should be to accelerate the provincewide implementation
of e-health records. This would allow pharmacists to see, at a glance,
whether a patient has already filled a prescription at another
pharmacy. It would allow doctors to see how much time has passed since
the patient last received a prescription for the drug. Doctors and
pharmacists have a professional obligation to do no harm, and should
have the information needed to fulfil that obligation.

Still, that wouldn't stop addicts and dealers from seeking the drug.
Pharmacies are already at risk from thieves seeking OxyContin for
their own use or to sell on the streets.

No society can eliminate the demand for drugs simply by restricting
the supply; changes in the availability of one drug will only alter
patterns of drug use in the market, for good or ill. The only way to
reduce overall demand is to help people make better choices, and
remove, as much as possible, the conditions that tend to coincide with
addiction. OxyContin is a drug of the poor, sometimes called
"hillbilly heroin;" addiction to it appears to be disproportionately
high among people on social assistance.

Ontario can also do a better job of providing and encouraging
treatment for oxycodone addiction, which is similar to treatment for
heroin addiction.

It would be foolish to ban oxycodone. It is a useful drug for patients
trying to manage extreme pain. It's never simple or easy to reduce the
damage done by abuse of any drug. It is, however, worth the effort,
whether the pill comes with a drugstore label or not.