mike_lee

according to usa today, addiction to prescription painkillers-which kill thousands of americans a year-has become a largely unrecognized epidemic, experts say. in fact, prescription drugs cause most of the more than 26,000 fatal overdoses each year, says leonard paulozzi of the [color=#00529b]centers for disease control and prevention. the number of overdose deaths from opioid painkillers-opium-like drugs that include morphine and codeine-more than tripled from 1999 to 2006, to 13,800 deaths that year, according to cdc statistics released wednesday. in the past, most overdoses were due to illegal narcotics, such as heroin, with most deaths in big cities. prescription painkillers have now surpassed heroin and cocaine, however, as the leading cause of fatal overdoses, paulozzi says. and the rate of fatal overdoses is now about as high in rural areas-7.8 deaths per 100,000 people-as in cities, where the rate is 7.9 deaths per 100,000 people, according to a paper he published last year in pharmacoepidemiology and drug safety. and my question is: why nursing textbooks ignore this problem??? full text: http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-09-30-drug-overdose_n.htm

Tell them what they want to hear and then do according to your plan