Ohio AG: Drug Companies Acted in a ‘Concerted Way’ to Target Doctors to Get People Addicted to Narcotics

RUSH EXCERPT:
DeWINE: "The essence of our case is this — historically these pain meds were used for end-of-life situations, someone has cancer, they are dying of cancer, they are also used for someone have the wisdom tooth out, they might take one or two. Beginning in the late 90s, what the drug companies did in a very concerted way, they spent hundreds of millions of dollars to do this, the doctors they were targeting were not really the pain specialists, they were the general practitioners, the family doctors that you and I would go to. If they targeted them and they wanted them to believe and told them these medications were not very addictive. They told them it was very, very appropriate for someone who has long term pain, chronic pain and they were very, very successful. Not only did they convince doctors, they convinced the public."