Pubdate: Thu, 26 Jul 2001
Source: Bristol Herald Courier (VA)
Copyright: 2001 Bristol Herald Courier
Contact: http://www.bristolnews.com/contact.html
Website: http://www.bristolnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1211
Author: Rick Wagner
Bookmark: Oxycontin http://www.mapinc.org/find?186

OXYCONTIN DISCUSSED AT CONFERENCE IN ABINGDON

ABINGDON -- Social workers said they found a 4-year-old Southwest 
Virginia girl earlier this year in a roach-infested trailer, her 
20-year-old aunt dead in a bathtub of an OxyContin overdose. The 
girl's mother lay nearby, passed out from abuse of the same 
prescription painkiller. After the state removed the girl and put her 
in foster care, her mother agreed to rehabilitation. But she later 
died in rehab from an overdose of methadone and other drugs. Two 
young adults dead and a little girl in foster care. Welcome to the 
world of illegal OxyContin use as seen by area social workers. At 
least 32 people died last year in Southwest Virginia from illegal 
OxyContin use, Virginia State Police 1st Sgt. Landon Gibbs told a 
substance abuse conference Wednesday at the Southwest Virginia Higher 
Education Center. State Police Special Agent Steve Matney said 
Tazewell County probably leads the region in illegal OxyContin 
trafficking and use, followed by Buchanan and Russell counties. But 
authorities said illegal OxyContin is available throughout the 
region, even in the form of high-potency pills the manufacturer no 
longer sells. "Over the past year and a half, we have seen a rise in 
the numbers of Child Protective Services complaints we are getting," 
said Mary Adams-Norris of the Virginia Department of Social Services. 
"We can directly relate them to substance abuse." She said social 
services reports have increased 30 percent to 40 percent in Southwest 
Virginia this year, with 40 percent to 50 percent of all cases 
related to substance abuse. Tom Fritz, director of the department's 
western region, said that was why the conference, funded by a federal 
grant, was organized.

The region is based in Abingdon and includes 21 localities from 
Christiansburg westward to Lee County. Alcoholism and the abuse of 
heroin and marijuana also plague the area and often are cited in 
children's services complaints, Fritz said. The case of the 
4-year-old, as well as three other cases Adams-Norris recounted, all 
occurred between March and July, she said. They involved 
substance-abusing parents slapping and hitting their children and two 
children who saw their mother beaten so badly by their father that 
she was hospitalized. Adams-Norris left out locations and other 
details to keep the children's identities confidential. About 250 
people, mostly social workers, attended the conference, titled "A 
Community Epidemic: A Matter of Substance." The conference is to 
continue today and focuses on multidisciplinary, inter-agency 
approaches to the "community problem" of substance abuse. "By that, I 
mean the entire community.

Substance abuse, and particularly the abuse of OxyContin, is a health problem.

But if affects the entire community," said Harriet McCombs, a senior 
mental health adviser with the U.S. Department of Health and Human 
Services. The State Police officers recounted the story of a recent 
Grundy pharmacy robbery.

They said a high-schooler held up the drugstore to get OxyContin, 
knocking a small boy down and hijacking a car. Gibbs of the State 
Police said prevention through education, treatment and the targeting 
of suppliers, users and dealers were critical, and he lauded a 
proposed Virginia prescription monitoring system. The system would be 
similar to one in use in Kentucky and would alert police, doctors and 
pharmacists to those who receive multiple prescriptions of OxyContin 
and other drugs. Strother Smith, an attorney and Anglican Catholic 
priest, said OxyContin can be a killer even when taken legally in 
doses as prescribed. Usually, illicit users of the synthetic morphine 
crush the pills and inject or snort them, but Smith said people have 
"died from taking the oral prescription only." He said he supports 
restricting OxyContin to hospitals and hospices. Smith and Abingdon 
attorney Emmitt Yeary represent seven plaintiffs suing 
Connecticut-based OxyContin-maker Perdue Pharma in federal court. The 
seven claim they have suffered damages due to their own OxyContin 
addictions or the abuse of the drug by family members.

They also claim Purdue Pharma marketed the drug aggressively while 
downplaying its risks. A Perdue Pharma representative had been 
scheduled to attend the conference but did not in light of the 
pending litigation, organizers said. Yeary and Smith want the court 
to force Purdue Pharma to open free clinics nationwide to help 
OxyContin addicts. "They're filling up our graveyards, prisons, 
welfare rolls and foster homes," Yeary alleged. "It's the ultimate 
rape of the mountains and mountain people."
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MAP posted-by: Kirk