In September, the Financial Times reported that Purdue Pharma had received a patent to treat opioid addiction. Essentially this means that the very organization responsible for our current opioid crisis would now be helping to end it. But before you get all teary-eyed thinking about how altruistic it sounds, don’t. Because money. Lots and lots of money.
“The patent is for a new version of buprenorphine, which is designed to control drug cravings and is often given to those who are addicted to heroin or opioid painkillers. The patent is reportedly for a “wafer” of the drug, which would dissolve in a few seconds. Currently, buprenorphine is prescribed in tablets or dissolvable strips.
‘While opioids have always been known to be useful in pain treatment, they also display an addictive potential,’ the patent states. ‘Thus, if opioids are taken by healthy human subjects with a drug-seeking behavior, they may lead to psychological, as well as physical dependence. These usually undesired characteristics of opioids can, however, become important in certain scenarios such as drug substitution therapies for drug addicts.'”1
Ya think?
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And guess who is listed as one of the six inventors on the patent?
None other than Richard Sackler. The Richard Sackler from Purdue Pharma.
Sackler currently sits on the board of the OxyContin maker and by some estimates has done more harm than Stalin. Again, he stands to make money ending the crisis he created. Utterly stunning.
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While Purdue Pharma has taken financial hits from several lawsuits and has stopped (they say) promoting opioids, do we really want them to benefit from the problem they willingly created?
I know I don’t.
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