‘This is your brain on drugs’ tweaked for today’s parents
Martha C. White, The New York Times
For a generation of commercial-watching adolescents, it was an indelible image: an egg, sizzling in a frying pan, representing "your brain on drugs." It was a straightforward message, and the ad’s final line — "Any questions?" — asked as the egg white clouded and cooked, was strictly rhetorical. Three decades later, the Partnership for Drug-Free Kids is bringing the frying pan out of retirement and firing up the stove again. But this time, questions are the point.
Aetna is notifying some doctors about their drug-dispensing habits
Lenny Bernstein, The Washington Post
Many experts say the prescription painkiller epidemic started when physicians began overprescribing powerful opioid medications, a well-meaning attempt to more aggressively treat patients' pain. With addiction to those pills at crisis levels, they argue, a good part of the solution would be for doctors to rein in use of the drugs. The giant health insurer Aetna is now actively encouraging change. Using the vast amount of data it collects from insurance claims by pharmacies, it has begun contacting doctors whose prescribing habits are far outside the norm.
The high cost of heroin addiction
DeMarco Morgan and Jonathan Blakely, CBS Evening News
"In the Shadow of Death: Jason's Journey" is a multi-part CBS Evening News series that follows Jason Amaral, a 30-year-old addict living in the Boston area, on his path to recovery. Check out stories as (Part 1) Jason hunts for drugs on the streets of Boston, (Part 2) Jason fights through the first days of rehab, and (Part 3) Jason's family shows what it is like to love a heroin addict.
Taken hostage and shot, Nebraska pharmacist reflects
on ‘strange’ day
Riley Johnson, Lincoln Journal Star
Barricaded inside his office with a gunman four years ago, Charles "Chas" Lierk realized there's no normal for pharmacy robberies. He and his heavily armed visitor, Andres "Andy" Gonzalez, talked about everything from heavy metal to Ron Paul while a SWAT team surrounded Thiele Pharmacy and Gifts on June 12, 2012. At one point, Lierk smoked a cigar with Gonzalez, who had already killed his father before heading to the pharmacy that day. After several hours, Lierk braced himself for death when Gonzalez ordered him to turn around and face the wall. "To be honest, I thought at that time I was dead—he was going to shoot me," Lierk, now 67, said in a recent interview.
