Last updated : February 17, 2025
News broke last week that Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family, have been ordered to pay 7.4B to families whose loved ones died due to an oxy overdose. States sought damages in the lawsuit as well. Has your life been affected in some way by the opioid crisis? It seems it surely must be the case by now.
Purdue manufactured and distributed oxycontin. It’s a semi-synthetic pain reliever that was widely prescribed by physicians when first coming out on the market. Once the drug’s highly addictive nature became evident, the number of prescriptions written dropped dramatically.
This settlement came after the Supreme Court overturned the initial deal struck with Purdue. That agreement would have shielded the Sackler family from any future opioid lawsuits. It isn’t included in the new settlement. Moreover, the Sackler family is forbidden from selling opioids in the United States and can no longer control Purdue Pharma.
Plaintiffs are looking to the future
Some Attorney Generals (AGs) in states that were a part of the bipartisan coalition of states and other parties that brought the lawsuit are informing the public of the result. Connecticut is set to receive 64 million over the next 8 years. Tennessee AG, Jonathan Skrmetti, anticipates the state to receive more than $90 million when it’s all said and done. And Vermont should gain a total of $22 million.
It will take up to fifteen years for the Sackler family to pay their share of $6.5 billion. Purdue Pharma, however, is ordered to pay close to $900 million upfront causing the company to go into bankruptcy.
When announcing the settlement, New York’s Attorney General, Letitia James, said, “Families throughout New York and across the nation are suffering from the immense pain and loss wrought by the opioid crisis.” She continued, “The Sackler family relentlessly pursued profit at the expense of vulnerable patients and played a critical role in starting and fueling the opioid epidemic. While no amount of money will ever fully repair the damage they caused, this massive influx of funds will bring resources to communities in need so that we can heal.”
We must keep pressing
We, along with millions of others, hope this is a major step in taking back our country from drugs. However, unscrupulous doctors are found all across the nation whose practice caters to addicts as they hop from office to office gathering prescriptions.
Moreover, oxycontin and other opioids are still readily available on the black market. This is even more devastating to families because not only are their loved ones able to purchase these drugs, but drug cartels are adding fentanyl to the ingredients list.
Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, has been identified as being 50 times more potent than heroin. As little as 2 grams of the drug, which can be likened to a few grains of salt, can prove lethal. Extremely dangerous in and of itself, people who purchase street versions of oxycontin, ecstasy, and virtually every other drug on the market, contain this cheaply and illegally made opioid analgesic.
Opioids aren’t a wonder drug
All opioids are highly addictive whether they are natural, semi-synthetic, or synthetic. Mexico and China cartels illegally manufacture synthetic opioids and smuggle them into the United States.
We barely had time to celebrate the fact that 2019 marked the first drop of reported deaths by overdose in decades before the onset of the pandemic in 2020. Since then, overdose deaths have steadily risen. This is due in part to the surge of fentanyl and other extremely lethal synthetic drugs.
After being ingested into the body by either snorting, injecting, or swallowing the drug, an opioid enters the bloodstream and travels through the body to the brain. It binds to the opioid receptors on certain nerve cells in the brain. They also bind to the receptors found in the spinal cord and other places throughout the body. All work together to control chronic pain and relieve stress as users experience a sense of euphoria and overall well-being.
There’s a downside
In addition to causing extreme happiness and feelings of being relaxed, opioids are known to cause changes in thinking. This can make it difficult to concentrate and make decisions which in turn causes feelings of anger and frustration.
We’ve mentioned that these drugs are addictive. Moreover, the brain forms a dependency on them meaning that it grows to think of its presence as being a normal occurrence. Over time, the user must up the dosage to achieve the drug’s desired effect. This increases the risk of overdose exponentially.
Other side effects associated with opioids are:
- Constipation
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Headache
- Dizziness
- Sleepiness
- Problems sleeping
- Slower heart rate
- Low blood pressure
- Heart failure
- Cardiac arrest
- Depression
- Sexual dysfunction
Moreover, taking high doses or using these drugs over an extended period may cause changes in the body that make a person more sensitive to pain.
There’s also an added risk for people who inject these drugs to contract life-threatening bacterial infections or diseases such as hepatitis C or human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) because addicts often share needles.
Signs of overdose
When someone ingests more of an opioid than the body can deal with, an overdose occurs.
Signs of an opioid overdose include:
- Unconsciousness
- Slow or shallow breathing
- Labored breathing
- Discolored, purplish skin—especially the lips or nails
- Small, constricted pupils that don’t react to light
When fentanyl was discovered in all types of illicit drugs, addicts began forming “buddy systems” so that someone could call for help if an overdose occurred. This has become a normal occurrence for many.
While it rarely affects a person overdosing on fentanyl, some city governments are making Narcan available to addicts free of charge. It temporarily reverses the effects of some opioids giving emergency responders time to administer life-saving techniques.
A long way to go
The outcome of the Perdue Pharma, Sackler family lawsuit is a cause for hope. It seems that, at last, big pharma can be held responsible for the creation and marketing of highly addictive drugs that, in the long run, have done far more harm than good.
We mentioned at the top of this article that it seems that everyone has been affected by the opioid epidemic to some degree. That, certainly, goes for our young people as well. Continued education about the dangers of drug abuse is vital. It gives them the tools they need to weigh the possible outcome of ever taking that first dose—and, hopefully, deciding to “just say no.”