Orders From Drug Companies For Thousands Of Pain Pills Should Have Been Halted

In all, 76 billion oxycodone and hydrocodone pills were shipped over that seven-year period, according to the DEA and its Automation of Reports and Consolidated Orders System (ARCOS). That data was obtained by the Washington Post and HD Media, which owns newspapers in West Virginia. The Post published the data after a federal judge overseeing litigation against drug companies in Cleveland agreed to release the information to the public.

The data shows that most pills per capita went to rural, working-class communities in the Appalachian region. Some communities, including several in West Virginia and Kentucky, received more than 100 pills each year for every person who lived in the community.

According to federal data, opioids — both prescription drugs such as Vicodin and OxyContin and illicit versions of fentanyl and illegal heroin — were factors in more than 400,000 deaths in the U.S. from 2000 through last year.

The leading opioid producers over that span were three companies that make generic drugs: SpecGX, Par Pharmaceutical and Activis Pharma. Together, they produced nearly 9 in 10 opioid pills that were shipped to pharmacies. The next biggest drugmaker was OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, which is often cast as the villain of the opioid crisis but produced just 3 percent of the opioid pills over the span. McKesson Corp., Walgreens, Cardinal Health and AmerisourceBergen were the largest opioid distribution companies from 2006 through 2012. Each distributed at least 9 billion pills, representing 12 percent to 18 percent of the total market. They were followed by other big pharmacy chains.

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