DEA agent: High cost of black market prescription pills leads to increase in heroin-related deaths

http://theadvocate.com/news/13102586-123/dea-agent-high-cost-of

In 1914 a Democratic controlled Congress passed The Harrison Narcotic Act and signed by a Democratic President Woodrow Wilson.. which took opiates out of all OTC meds and the courts determined that opiate addiction was a crime.. and threatening any doctors that was discovered to be treating a addict their medical license would be revoked.  This created the black market for opiates and MJ. Then some 55 yrs later another Democratic controlled Congress and a Republican President Nixon created The Controlled Substance Act 1970  that created the BNDD/DEA and declared a war on drugs… to eradicate the black market that they had created decades earlier. Now they are blaming their crack down on the illegal use of legal prescription meds .. for the increase of Heroin use/abuse/deaths.. Is this like a fire fighter that is also a arsonist … that starts fires.. so that he/she can help put them out ?

Heroin-related deaths are on the rise in the Baton Rouge area, and prescription medications are the so-called “gateway drugs” to blame for the problem.

The high cost of prescription tablets on the black market drive inexperienced dealers to mold heroin with random ingredients into what looks like traditional pills, and unwitting buyers are ingesting them, he said.

“That’s why these heroin overdose deaths are skyrocketing in our region,” said Davis.

Just three ago, in 2012, five people died due to heroin overdoses in East Baton Rouge parish, but those deaths shot up to 34 the following year and were recorded at 28 last year, according to the parish coroner’s office. This year, there already have been 22 such deaths in the parish, said Coroner Dr. William “Beau” Clark.

The increase mirrors a national trend in heroin-related deaths, which nearly quadrupled from 2002 to 2013, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Two Baton Rouge doctors — Walter Ellis and James Hines — were arrested due to DEA investigations into illegal prescription drug distribution over the past year and a half.

Terry said purchasing illegal prescription drugs can take the hard edge off the illicit transactions.

“I know when I did undercover, I actually preferred buying pills to crack because the transactions were safer, they were quicker and there was less negotiation,” he said.

And one factor to eye might be the recreational use of pills by college students, he said.

“Adderall, of course, is like sweet tarts for a college student, unfortunately” he said, referring to a medication intended to treat attention problems misused by some students for intense studying.

While not all college-aged drug users graduate to serious prescription pill abuse, many do, especially in the context of apathetic or uninformed parents, he said.

“Once they jump that hurdle and become more desperate, we tend to see it more.”

Filed under: General Problems