BOSTON — A federal jury on Thursday found the top executives of Insys Therapeutics, a company that sold a fentanyl-based painkiller, guilty of racketeering charges in a rare criminal prosecution that blamed corporate officials for contributing to the nation’s opioid epidemic. The jury, after deliberating for 15 days, issued guilty verdicts against the company’s founder,… Read More »
The opioid crisis is at the center of a national disparity in how the public views and responds to drug addiction, according to a study published Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association Internal Medicine. The health care community funnels too many drugs to low-income white patients, triggering addiction, while people of color who… Read More »
Opinion writers weigh in on these health topics and others. Los Angeles Times: Want To Reduce Opioid Use? Nudge The Doctors Who Prescribe Them An Orange County doctor was arrested by federal authorities in December on suspicion of illegally prescribing narcotics, “flooding Southern California with huge quantities of opioids,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.… Read More »
Pregnancy-associated mortality, defined as the death of a woman during pregnancy or within one year of the termination of pregnancy, is increasing in Massachusetts. In 2012, there were 30.4 deaths/100,000 live births. In 2014, the rate increased by 33%, to 40.4 deaths per 100,000 live births. Because pregnancy-associated mortality rates have historically been relatively low… Read More »