Pubdate: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 Source: Brandon Sun (CN MB) Copyright: 2004, Brandon Sun Contact: http://www.brandonsun.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2437 Author: Eliza Barlow Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/oxycontin.htm (Oxycontin/Oxycodone) 'HILLBILLY HEROIN' KILLER A second death in Brandon has been linked to the so-called "hillbilly heroin" - illegal use of the potent prescription painkiller OxyContin - - prompting warnings from police and the medical community. "We're concerned that there seems to be a rise in the use of this as a street drug," said Sgt. Shane Corley of the Brandon Police Service. "We want to make people aware that this is a dangerous drug." Corley was tight-lipped about the most recent death, saying only that police suspect OxyContin was involved in the death of a young Brandon woman in mid-August. Toxicology results confirming their suspicions haven't come back yet and an investigation continues, though police don't suspect foul play in the death. However, police have just received toxicology results on a 36-year-old woman whose sudden death July 7 in a 12th Street apartment prompted police to lay a charge of criminal negligence causing death against 31-year-old Sean Devine. "The report showed the presence of alcohol and a high level of oxycodone (generic name for OxyContin)," Corley said. "We're still waiting on the autopsy report to stipulate the cause of death." OxyContin, a synthetic opiate, is a powerful and highly addictive painkiller that is prescribed to treat moderate to severe pain - often in sufferers of cancer or Crohn's disease. Prescriptions for the drug have skyrocketed across Manitoba in the last few years. While 4,495 prescriptions for OxyContin were dispensed at community pharmacies in 2001, the number of prescriptions jumped to 11,937 in 2003, Manitoba Health reports. Police and physicians in Brandon say there's no question the drug is increasingly being used not as a painkiller but as a means to get high and even to make money. "It's likely that a significant amount of it gets diverted into illegal or suspect usage," Brandon physician Dr. Derry Decter said. "And it's dangerous because both patients and doctors tend to underestimate how potent and dangerous and addictive it is." Most people who abuse the drug do so by crushing the pills, diluting them in water and injecting them into their bodies with a syringe. What is supposed to be a time-released medication in tablet form hits the addict's body with full potency, giving a heroin-like high and increasing the risk of an overdose. While a 40-milligram tablet costs less than $3 at a pharmacy, Corley said the drug is now selling on the street for $40 to $60 a pill. Decter said the drug should be taken off Manitoba's drug formulary and banned outright. "There's other, safer alternatives (for treating chronic pain)," he said. In Newfoundland, where seven deaths and a string of crimes have been blamed on the OxyContin since 2001, the provincial government set up a task force last year to look for ways to combat widespread abuse of the drug. In August, the task force came out with more than 50 recommendations on how to crack down on the non-medical use of the drug. Those recommendations included giving people's medical information to police to stop people from getting the drug through double-doctoring or other illegal means. But in Manitoba, where OxyContin has been a factor at least 17 deaths since 2002, according to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the government hasn't even placed the drug under review. A Manitoba Health official said the province already has procedures to guard against double-doctoring - which occurs when a person gets a prescription filled, then within a 30-day period, gets the same drug from another doctor without disclosing information about what medications are already being taken. "When pharmacies fill prescriptions (for OxyContin), we automatically provide them with that person's records for the last three months," said Jack Rosentreter, executive director of provincial drug programs for Manitoba Health. Rosentreter said prescriptions for the drug are only valid for three days and that copies of the prescription are kept by the patient's doctor, the dispensing pharmacy and the College of Physicians and Surgeons. He said the Manitoba Drug Standards and Therapeutics Committee will wait for complaints about OxyContin to come in before it will discuss changing the availability of the drug. "If something like that came to me it would go to the committee and we would review it," he said. Rosentreter added the number of prescriptions for OxyContin may be increasing due to the province's 20-month-old palliative care program, which provides free drugs to people who want to spend their final days at home rather than in the hospital. But Decter said the government shouldn't wait for complaints to come in. "We have a chance in Manitoba to avoid the problems they're having in the Maritimes," he said. Devine, the man charged in connection with the 36-year-old woman's July 7 death, remains out on bail. He will be back in court on Oct. 21. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek