Jan 4 Drug Headlines

METH – USA
Meth: The Overstated Assiction – Coastal Post Online
The Department of Justice has declared today National Methamphetamine Awareness Day. What better way to observe it than taking a break from the hype?

ADDICTION – USA
Kicking an addiction, with real people – International Herald Tribune
NEW YORK: Every time they turn around, smokers are being lectured by nonsmokers about health risks and costs to society, but many of them keep smoking anyway, so pharmaceuticals and anti-smoking groups are turning to smokers and ex-smokers themselves to make the point.

OXYCODONE – USA
Drug deaths on the rise – York Daily Record
Drug users walk a razor's edge between the ultimate high and death, and, in York County last year, the prescription drug Fentanyl became the rage, according to the York County Corner's Office.

PAINKILLERS – USA
Painkiller's toll high – Courier Post
A wave of overdoses involving fentanyl, a powerful narcotic often mixed with street drugs, killed at least 98 people in the tri-county area last year, state officials say.

METHADONE – USA
Methadone toll hits W.Va. hardest – Charleston Gazette
A new study reveals that almost 4,000 Americans died of an overdose of the prescription drug methadone in 2004, more than any other prescription narcotic.

ADDICTION – USA
More Legal Controversy Over Zyprexa
The recent $500 million dollar class action settlement on the part of drug manufacturer Eli Lilly makes necessary a reexamination of the industry's legal responsibility to its customers and the crucial relationships between the FDA, the manufacturers, and the doctors who ultimately prescribe the drugs they make. The company agreed to pay an average of $27,000 to the 18,000 plaintiffs involved in the suit, each of whom claimed to have been damaged by Lilly's top drug, the antipsychotic Zyprexa.