MORE SHOULD BE DONE TO CURB ONLINE DRUG SALES

The Internet revolutionized the way the world does business.
Unfortunately, it also seems to have revolutionized the way drug
dealers do business.

A series of reports in this week's editions of The Sun has shown how
disturbingly easy it is for anybody to get prescription narcotics
from online pharmacies. A minimal telephone consultation from a
physician's assistant and old medical records were all it took for
one online pharmacy to send 90 high-strength painkillers to a Sun
reporter recently. One former drug dealer recounted how easy it was
for her to get multiple shipments of narcotics shipped straight to
her door, which were then put out on the streets, netting her
hundreds of thousands of dollars.

While being able to purchase an Optimus Prime cookie jar at midnight
from the comfort of your couch on an online auction site may be
harmless fun, being able to buy hundreds of prescription painkillers
without seeing a doctor face to face is just wrong.

Requiring doctors to see patients in person before prescribing
powerful and addictive narcotics should be mandatory. Although some
prescription mills still would allow patients to have whatever drug
they want without a valid medical reason, those doctors are in the
minority. Most physicians will not issue a prescription without a
good reason, which would help limit the number of pills hitting the streets.

A new state law went into effect Monday which should prohibit all but
just a handful of online pharmacies from doing business in Kentucky.
Internet pharmacies now must be licensed to sell and ship
prescription drugs to Kentucky residents. But even legislators doubt
the law's ability to stem the tide of narcotics flowing into the
state. More should and must be done to put teeth into this new law.

While law enforcement officers have for years trolled the Internet
pretending to be children to ensnare would-be child molesters, the
state needs to do the same for online pharmacies. Money, time and
personnel need to be set aside for enforcement of this law. Let law
enforcement agents go fishing on the Internet to see who will ship
drugs to Kentucky illegally and once a violator is found, throw the
book at them.

The federal government also must do its part. The proposed Ryan
Haight Internet Pharmacy Consumer Protection Act of 2005, which
places strict controls on Internet pharmacy sites, also needs to be
passed. Rather than leave this issue to the states to assemble their
own hodgepodge of laws, the federal government should take charge, as
it has done with drugs such as marijuana.

This is not an issue to be taken lightly. Drugs still are a
tremendous problem all across America. Illegal drugs leave in their
wake shattered lives and families. Winchester residents have died and
will continue to die from them.

Americans are flooded every day with e-mails from Internet pharmacies
promising powerful drugs with little or no oversight from doctors.
While there may be some benefit to online pharmacies for the
disabled, the elderly or those in isolated places, they also can be a
source for the thriving industry of drug trafficking.

More restraints and tighter oversight must be placed upon these
pharmacies. It should be harder to get painkillers like Lortab of
Xanax than it is to check your e-mail.