As our nation battles a well-publicized opioid crisis, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and MedPage Today have published a joint investigative report chronicling the overprescription of yet another drug produced by Big Pharma to sate the masses’ appetite for a legal buzz. The new report claims that legal amphetamines prescribed as ADHD drugs is causing “a trail of misuse, addiction and death”—following the path of opioids.
Twenty years ago, few people had heard of ADHD (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder). ADD, as ADHD was known back then, was a diagnosis for hyperactive kids and doctors prescribed Adderall or Ritalin to treat it. ADHD was a “seldom-diagnosed disorder” in adults, but it has become more and more common as prescription standards have become more lax.
With Big Pharma actively pushing their wares like street peddlers, sales of ADHD drugs have jumped 42% since 2010. Since 2013, the Food and Drug Administration has received 19,000 complaints of complications arising from ADHD drugs like Adderall, Ritalin, Concerta, and Vyvanse.
Recreational use of Adderall has also grown tremendously, with the latest available federal data reporting that 1.4 million people used the drug in 2014 compared to only 345,000 in 2006.
Emergency room visits for the drugs are also rising—cases involving the legal amphetamines have quadrupled in seven years. One in 23 adult Americans are reportedly affected by ADHD—that’s 10 million people.
“The streets are awash with Adderall,” said Nicolas Rasmussen, a medical historian who studies the history of amphetamines in the U.S. “Amphetamines are grossly overused.”
Instead of trying to help or heal our nation, Big Pharma has actively exploited people with addiction problems. The report said that experts and organizations that have tried to expand the diagnostic definition of ADHD often had financial ties to Big Pharma. In collusion with the drug companies, they helped create a market for the drugs, funneling millions—if not billions—of dollars into their pockets.
“While opioids are more lethal than prescription stimulants, some experts see parallels between the opioid epidemic and the increase of problems tied to stimulants,” the report says.
“In the opioid epidemic, users switched from prescription narcotics to heroin and illicit fentanyl. With the ADHD drugs, [patients] have switched from legally prescribed stimulants to illicit ones, such as methamphetamine and cocaine.”
Legal or illegal drugs are the same, it’s all about the money that can be generated.
