PAINKILLER INGREDIENT LINKED TO MORE FLORIDA DEATHS THAN HEROIN

ORLANDO, Fla. (KRT) -- Sylvia Cover remembers her husband telling the
physician, "Just fix me up, Doc, so I can get back to work and take care of
my family."

Six months later, Gerry Cover was dead.

Hooked on a powerful painkiller called OxyContin, the 39-year-old handyman
and father of three died from an accidental overdose. The drug had been
prescribed by his doctor for pain from a mild herniated disc.

The Kissimmee, Fla., man's death in September 2000 was an individual
family's tragedy. But a nine-month investigation by the Orlando Sentinel
found a broader, more disturbing pattern: During 2001 and 2002, more than
200 deaths statewide have been linked to the highly potent painkiller that
has been criticized as being aggressively marketed and eagerly prescribed
with only routine oversight from government regulators.

OxyContin, made by Purdue Pharma of Stamford, Conn., is a 12-hour
time-release drug with the same potential for abuse and addiction as morphine.

The active ingredient in OxyContin and dozens of other strong painkillers
is oxycodone, which comes from the opium poppy. The drug is so powerful it
is sometimes called "heroin in a pill" and most recently has been linked to
a prescription-drug investigation involving conservative commentator Rush
Limbaugh.

The Sentinel's investigation tracked how three key forces - Purdue's strong
marketing campaign, the government's lax controls and a medical community
unschooled in OxyContin's true power - have contributed to a wave of
addiction and death.

In turn, illegal use of the medicine has grown as more patients have become
dependent on the drug and a new black market has emerged.

Jim McDonough, head of the governor's Office of Drug Policy, said he found
the results troubling in light of unreleased reports that show oxycodone
overdoses in Florida for the first half of this year continue to rise. He
plans to respond with a number of legislative and educational proposals to
counter what he called "overwhelming salesmanship to expound on the
benefits of these drugs without enough cautions."

"There always was that suspicion when you did have data surrounding the
death scene that the predominant drug that seemed to be there was
OxyContin," McDonough said.

"If this was a rash of crimes resulting in death we wouldn't stand for it."

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which approved OxyContin in 1995 and
which has come under fire for failing to respond adequately to safety
concerns about the drug, turned down repeated requests to comment on the
Sentinel's findings.

Purdue denies its marketing ever put the public's safety at risk.

"Allegations that Purdue's marketing contributed to diversion and abuse are
simply not true," said company spokesman Jim Heins, referring to the
rerouting of drugs from medical to illegal use. "No evidence has been found
to support these allegations."

Purdue executives, battling hundreds of lawsuits and several investigations
throughout the country, blame bad publicity on a few criminal doctors and
drug abusers who used their pain medication illegally.

In fact, the company says, there are about 2 million patients nationwide
being helped by the painkiller. Purdue says no one has ever become addicted
to OxyContin when taking it as prescribed.

The Sentinel's investigation, however, found evidence that dozens of
oxycodone overdoses in Florida involved patients such as Gerry Cover.

The newspaper launched its inquiry after the Florida Attorney General's
Office ended a tobacco-industry-style investigation last year of Purdue's
marketing practices.

The yearlong investigation ended Nov. 1, 2002, when Florida Attorney
General Bob Butterworth signed an agreement promising never to sue Purdue
for any actions up to that point. Purdue pledged $2 million toward a
prescription-tracking program that has failed to gain legislative approval.

Butterworth and one of his assistants who helped in the probe, Dave
Aronberg, acknowledged that their enthusiasm was dampened by calls from
pain patients who feared the drug might be pulled from the market and by an
online poll that showed little support for a lawsuit.

In its research, the newspaper examined 500 autopsy reports from across
Florida, reviewed more than 5,000 pages from the state's inquiry and
interviewed scores of health-care professionals, law-enforcement officers,
OxyContin patients, addicts and drug-rehabilitation experts.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement tracks drug-related deaths based
on toxicology tests performed during autopsies. Everyone from doctors to
law-enforcement officers follows deadly drug trends outlined in semiannual
reports.

Illegal substances such as heroin once topped the charts. Today,
prescription drugs turn up more often than street drugs. Drugs with
oxycodone were not tracked as a separate class until 2001, after state
officials said they became alarmed about anecdotal reports of OxyContin
overdoses.

From Jan. 1, 2001, to Dec. 31, 2002, Florida's 24 medical-examiner
districts reported that oxycodone overdoses caused 573 deaths. But because
oxycodone is available in almost 60 medications, no one knew which specific
painkillers were involved in the overdose deaths.

To find out, the Sentinel obtained copies of the 500 autopsy reports in the
573 overdose cases. Some deaths are still under active law-enforcement
investigation and autopsy results were not public record. The newspaper
also reviewed hundreds of police records and talked to relatives or
witnesses to identify the pain medication involved.

The key findings:

.Oxycodone was more deadly than heroin during 2001 and 2002 in Florida. The
573 deaths reported as caused by oxycodone overdoses compare with 521
deaths caused by heroin overdoses during the same period.

.The most recent statistics publicly available, from 2000, show OxyContin
accounted for 25 percent of the market for oxycodone prescriptions. But the
Sentinel's research showed OxyContin was the drug identified in about 83
percent of the 247 cases linked to a specific medication. In the remaining
253 oxycodone deaths, the Sentinel was unable to determine a brand-name drug.

.The Sentinel review of the 500 oxycodone deaths found 87 people who had a
history of back pain, 19 who were recuperating from surgery and 157 others
with health conditions that included arthritis, AIDS, cancer and car-crash
injuries. By contrast, 38 cases could be identified in which users had no
health issues beyond recreational drug abuse.

.Purdue has directed drug-education efforts mostly toward teenagers. But
the average oxycodone overdose victim is 40 years old, the autopsy reports
show. And white, middle-aged men between the ages of 30 and 60 - many with
back pain or other medical problems - accounted for 254 oxycodone deaths.

Purdue officials would not comment on the details of the Sentinel's autopsy
review, referring instead to the company's own study of more than 1,000
"drug-abuse deaths" nationwide involving oxycodone from 1999 to 2002. That
study, published in March, found only 30 of the deaths involved oxycodone
alone, and only 12 of those were specifically tied to OxyContin.

The newspaper's approach differed from the Purdue study in many ways. One
key difference: The Sentinel pinpointed cases in which medical examiners
had determined oxycodone to be the cause of death, not simply "involved."
And Purdue's study relied on a scattershot sampling of cases from 23
states, not a comprehensive review of a single category of overdoses in one
state.

Meanwhile, Purdue is set to launch another painkiller that is 10 times more
powerful than morphine. Purdue's Palladone, which the FDA reviewed in
September, is a time-released version of hydromorphone, sold under the
brand name Dilaudid. A drug-enforcement official called Dilaudid "the drug
of choice for addicts."

The FDA is weighing the drug's potential for abuse before making a final
decision. OxyContin was approved before consideration of abuse forgetting
conversations and dates. He was obsessed with counting pills. He made sure
his OxyContin was always close at hand, fearing the horrendous withdrawal
symptoms that might kick in otherwise.

On Sept. 19, 2000, it looked as though the Covers' lives were turning around.

Gerry Cover had been seeing a pain-management specialist who was helping
him reduce his medication to 20-milligram doses. Just what happened that
night might never be fully known. Sylvia Cover and her son Gerry Jr., 18,
were watching television while Gerry Sr. was napping. Sylvia checked on her
husband and heard him snoring.

When she returned a little later, she found him blue and cold. An autopsy
determined that he had a lethal dose of oxycodone.

Cover's death left his wife and children emotionally and financially
devastated, and they are suing Purdue Pharma. Foreclosure of their modest
home hangs over their heads.

Last Christmas, Cover made a homemade card for her son. Inside was an IOU
until the day comes she can afford to buy a present.

"Our house used to always be full of family and friends," Sylvia Cover
said. "We even had a party for Groundhog Day.

"But I no longer have a life."