Big Pharma is starting to face consequences for its role in the opioid crisis. “Dopesick” author Beth Macy joins Ali Velshi to discuss whether it will be enough for the millions of people suffering from the epidemic to continue suing big drug companies.
» Subscribe to MSNBC:
MSNBC delivers breaking news, in-depth analysis of politics headlines, as well as commentary and informed perspectives. Find video clips and segments from The Rachel Maddow Show, Morning Joe, Meet the Press Daily, The Beat with Ari Melber, Deadline: White House with Nicolle Wallace, Hardball, All In, Last Word, 11th Hour, and more.
Connect with MSNBC Online
Visit msnbc.com:
Subscribe to MSNBC Newsletter:
Find MSNBC on Facebook:
Follow MSNBC on Twitter:
Follow MSNBC on Instagram:
Opioid Cases Could Have Ripple Effect On Similar Suits | Velshi & Ruhle | MSNBC
Good these wicked greedy need who put profit over lives bringing down a peg or two!!
This opiate crisis caused me to have a heartache from the pain and stress on my body, and I was already terminal from chronic pancreatitis.
Pancreatitis from drinking?
There are ppl who need these drugs and now can’t get them.
The only people that can get opioids now are addicts and rich white yuppies. Docs get to say that prescribing numbers are down, even if nothing changes. Zero solutions. 100% theater so everyone in power can keep the circlejerk going while people who needed the medications just get screwed.
@orphan 200
Only if you can find a pain mgmnt dr, which take up to four months to get an appointment to see. By that time, one has cried themselves to sleep each night. Im sick and on 16 scripts, 12 of which are tablets. All of my meds worked well with each other. I had to retire bc the pain was too much to stand at the pulpit anymore. I was functional up until the pullback started. Now I stay awake until 7 am bc I have to fall asleep from exhaustion caused by the pain.
It just makes me upset. Those who need it, cant get it. Those that are rich, can.
@Rev. Kaelene Lord Have you tried using cannabis yet? If you’re in California, it’s legal. THC helps ease pain, and CBD helps one sleep. It got me through chemo better than oxycontin and didn’t give me nausea or headaches.
@Rev. Kaelene Lord i a, so sorry tha tyou are going thru this. PPl do not realize how pain affects your life. did you know that it can raise your BP. One dr says can’t they fix that jaw. Well I have had 5 operations that has just made it worse. Now pains meds are hard to find. You know what is going to happen ppl are going to start doing street drugs for the pain their drs won’t know and some one is going to die for lack of drugs. Some ppl screw up and others have to suffer.
Acupuncture. Massage. Yoga.
@Lily jade,
Meds for pain are cheap or free. All those things you mentioned are far beyond the earnings of a person of limitation. Some of them have to be done twice or three times a week. $50 × 3 = 15 ×’s four weeks= $600 a month. Time to think ‘reality’ here. Its so easy for someone to suggest other things, but $1.30 a month vs. $600 a month. Not everyone is rich. I use meditation, but one has to move beyond the pain, first. Otherwise, most holistic’s cost an arm and a leg. And thats not even including the $100’s for herbal perscriptions.
I agree there is a terrible problem, but my Doctor won’t even entertain the Fact I am in 24 Hour pain in my neck and upper back Areas. So to tame the abusers, you forget there are people with Genuine PAIN.
@Ro G
Oxy always make me barf. Allergic to it. I was on another med that has no dopey effects. I only took 5mgs upon waking up and another 5mgs 12 hrs later. I dont want to say the name. But it is a perscription and legal. It just falls within that schedule l area. ( nothing like peyote, or other psychedelic)
Thank you for the suggestion👍🏼!
@Rev. Kaelene Lord
Just be careful and only take what you need..which it sounds like you are doing. Hope your pain is manageable. Take care! 😃
@Ro G
Thank you. I will.🖖
One of these lawsuits will make it to the supreme court and we all know how that’s going to end.
Im one of those who got swept under the rug. I have something inopperable. And have been on extremely low dose and I had to wean myself off of them bc my dr could not find a pain mgmnt dr for me. The meds never made me feel dopey, now I am just left with the pain. I now have to use something medicinally that makes me feel stoned. Two puffs every two hours. I feel like a frigging zombie every minute of my day now. MAKES ME UPSET!
When those who died of extremely high doses caused a whiplash by the gov saying all who took them were addicts. Those on low doses, often too small for pain mgmnt drs, have to live in bed. I was totally functioning, coherent, and articulate. Now I feel like the walking dead.
SMOOTH MOVE TO THE POLITICIANS! I understand about overdosing, but I never even took a tab until the pain had me doubled over. That way it did not create a mental addiction. It simply promoted my system to utilize the tabs for chemicals in my body bc it can not create the pain control endorphins.
Snaggle Toothed you have no idea what you are talking about. There are truly people who have taken these meds for years/decades and have been compliant. It is possible to use these meds correctly without becoming an addict. Your attitude is part of what is hurting chronic pain patients.
@Snaggle Toothed
When you have cancer and you have a pesky know it all interrupting, then you deal with it. I never invited you into the discussion about alleviating the pain from cancer. Now, respectfully, get lost. I will be muting you bc this is something your mother should talk to you about. If you are going to enter a conversation between two with something inopperable. 🙋♀️Bye!
@The Baby Nerd
Thank you. I muted him. Some kids just think they know everything He sounds like someone who has been pampered and never had to face having an inopperable condition. Trolls are one thing a pain patient does not need at all!
@Rev. Kaelene Lord
You’re in denial. The first step to sobriety is accepting you have a problem.
@Rev. Kaelene Lord This sums up your problem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJ18y3F-g2E
Go after the Doctors who prescribe it as well. If someone walks in with back pain and a doctor’s only suggestion is pain pills then he should be sued
That is true today. But in the early days, Purdue told the doctors that oxy’s were not addictive and the indications they documented were way overblown. Greedy greedy greedy b@stards.
Ro G it’s sad that today you can’t even trust your own doctors.
Dear Mr Velschi and Ms Macy, Thank you Mr Velschi for your very interesting reporting, you make a great team with Ms Ruhle. I am writing to say that the amounts of money people are able to get from lawsuits in the USA has reached the point of being absurd. Who would want to manufacture anything in your country knowing how much someone can take you to court for. We see gardners walk out with money to make President Trump jealous. Seriously, opioid addiction is horrendous. Like heroin, it’s an addiction that few are able to break away from. But just because someone makes a scotch whiskey that everyone can’t stop drinking, and they give up their job and life and kids and family just to buy whiskey, should Johnny Whatever Scotch have to pay for that? The people popping the pills, or shooting up junk need help, so give it to ‘em. But to say it’s Big Pharma to blame is a little like saying to an obese person, “it’s not your fault, it’s those evil people at Mars making those chocolates too darn good”. You are the experts, but I think it’s ridiculous to keep suing companies who make stuff that people want and buy. Keep up the good work! Beware of burnout –
The executives of these companies need to be sent to jail. They should not be able to buy their way out of this.
Obviously, that is the American way.
Jail for those responsible is the only real deterrent. They will just raise fees, prices and premiums to recoup their losses.
Fake news
Go after Ronald Reagan and Oliver North for all the cocaine they supplied to poor communities.
My oncologist refused to give me a medical marijuana card, but prescribed oxycontin like it was candy. Thank g_d for my younger daughter, who baked me special cookies. A month after my cancer was licked, my mailbox was filled with brochures for addiction clinics. If I had treated the pain caused by chemo with the drugs I’d been prescribed, I probably would have become addicted. There are plenty of people who face chronic pain, and risk addiction. It is long past time that cannabis was legalized
@Deborah Freedman,
You have to go to a medicinal marijuana clinic. Dr’s are still operating under Federal guidelines. Medicinal marijuana according to Fed regs is still a schedule l drug. There are drs specialized in it. They will be at the special clinic. Bring your medical records, copy of diagnoses. The certificate is about $65 a year. You need to bring certificate whenever you go to purchase medical grade at a store. It also depends on whether your state has shops like this. I would suggest googling for your zip location. I hate to see anyone going through pain. Especially with what you have. Do you have a phone book bc shops will be listed there. I have had to sit at bedside too many critically ill from my church. The quality of their life did improve. Especially with anxiety, depression and inopperable pain. I will keep you in my prayers.
P.S.- we have one very immature person on this post who has already acted like a child around this subject matter. Be prepared for something childlike from him. I dont care bc until someone is faced with their own mortality, do they have the maturity to understand that pain relief is a quality of life issue.
Yet another reason why we (hardworking, law abiding, tax paying Americans) are all going to vote Trump into a second term in 2020! God bless America!
Wait what? What you vote is your business but what does Trump have to do with this progress? The only think this current administration has done in these relations, is talk a big game, cut funding for rehab, and repeatedly block efforts to get an affordable generic for Narcan on the US market (acute lifesaver-treatment for opioid overdose, it works well and saves many lives but the brand Narcan is terribly expensive, so many hospitals, clinics and EMTs cannot afford to stock it).
L B not
Do not accept any offer from Purdue to settle.
They offered $10 billion. But last year, they had $35 billion in sales.
Do not let them off easy.
They made their fortune knowing oxy was highly addictive. And they to this day, do not care one bit.
Opoid crises is a excuse to use darpa I.e. aspr
You don’t see anyone suing over cannabis overdoses…….
How dare these companies buy people off. What happened to El Chapo? They’ve done as much or more damage to the country and people’s lives. If they get away with this it will be worse than what happened during Prohibition.
The black community got cheated with the war on drugs