The Dark Side Of America's Rush Into Prescription Drugs Has Never Been More Obvious

October 18, 2013
by Erin Fuchs
Business Insider

The number of people in America who died from taking prescription pain killers quadrupled between 1999 and 2010, a new report from the Trust for America's Health says.

These fatalities now outnumber deaths from heroin and cocaine combined, that same report found. More than 12 million people said they abused prescription drugs in 2010. The only other drug people abuse more is marijuana, the White House noted in a 2011 report.

In a tiny Kentucky county of 12,000 people, nine people died in a nine-month period by taking pain killers they traveled to Florida to obtain, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.

"It's epidemic. I don't know what the answer is," coroner Robert J. Powell told the paper.

View the full story (some sites require registration)