Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Doctors are largely responsible for the high rate of pain killer abuse because they don’t take the risks seriously enough, the DEA said Thursday, Bloomberg reports.
“This drug has got a hold of this society and it’s killing us,” Joseph Rannazzisi, deputy assistant administrator in the DEA’s office of diversion control, said at a FDA advisory meeting in Silver Springs, Md. “There’s so many prescriptions out there and I’ll tell you why. The medical community, in my humble opinion, is not taking this drug seriously.”
The FDA is debating the DEA’s request to reduce how long doctors can prescribe hydrocodone pills.
The request also would bar physicians assistants and nurse practitioners from prescribing pain killers, Bloomberg reported.
