cross-referenced news and research resources about
opioids
Opioids are substances that act on Opioid receptors to produce morphine-like effects. Medically they are primarily used for pain relief, including anesthesia. Other medical uses include suppression of diarrhea, replacement therapy for opioid use disorder, reversing opioid overdose, suppressing cough, and suppressing opioid induced constipation. Extremely potent Opioids such as carfentanil are only approved for veterinary use. Opioids are also frequently used non-medically for their euphoric effects or to prevent withdrawal.
Side effects of Opioids may include itchiness, sedation, nausea, respiratory depression, constipation, and euphoria. Tolerance and dependence will develop with continuous use, requiring increasing doses and leading to a withdrawal syndrome upon abrupt discontinuation. The euphoria attracts recreational use, and frequent, escalating recreational use of Opioids typically results in addiction. An overdose or concurrent use with other depressant drugs commonly results in death from respiratory depression.
Opioids act by binding to opioid receptors, which are found principally in the central and peripheral nervous system and the gastrointestinal tract. These receptors mediate both the psychoactive and the somatic effects of Opioids. Opioid drugs include partial agonists, like the anti-diarrhea drug loperamide and antagonists like naloxegol for opioid-induced constipation, which do not cross the blood-brain barrier, but can displace other Opioids from binding in those receptors.
Because of opioid drugs' reputation for addiction and fatal overdose, most are controlled substances. In 2013, between 28 and 38 million people used Opioids illicitly (0.6% to 0.8% of the global population between the ages of 15 and 65). In 2011, an estimated 4 million people in the United States used Opioids recreationally or were dependent on them. As of 2015, increased rates of recreational use and addiction are attributed to over-prescription of opioid medications and inexpensive illicit heroin. Conversely, fears about over-prescribing, exaggerated side effects and addiction from Opioids are similarly blamed for under-treatment of pain.
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updated Thu. April 25, 2024
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KPBS
April 13, 2018
RELATED: How Many Opioid Overdoses Are Suicides? Braverman said his office is stepping up fentanyl investigations along the southern border. "To identify those people in Mexico that are manufacturing these opioids and shipping them to San Diego," he said. "Bring charges against them, and extraditeÃâà...
Minnesota Public Radio News
April 13, 2018
One response by the medical industry was to cut back opioid prescriptions, which have been falling since 2010. Halena Gazelka, an anesthesiologist at the Mayo Clinic and chair of the clinic's opioid stewardship program, said there's still room for physicians to trim the amount of opioids they prescribe.
Alexandria Times
April 13, 2018
... and the Opioid Work Group, several interested community members attended the event. The action planning meeting was the work group's next phase after hosting a town hall meeting on Feb. 28 titled “A Community Conversation: Heroin and Other Opioids.” While the last meeting sparked a conversationÃâà...
TheFix.com
April 13, 2018
The study found that the rate of opioid prescriptions increased at an annual rate of 14.3% between 1999 and 2010. Then, amid tightening regulation, prescription rates fell 4.3% that year. The increase of fatal overdoses involving prescription opioids slowed, from increasing 13.4% annually prior to 2010 toÃâà...
Popular Science
April 13, 2018
If someone in your life uses opioids, whether by prescription or not, it's a good idea to have naloxone on hand in case of an overdose. Why? Because overdoses happen every day, and often in places where it takes time for the patient to get help. “Each day we lose 115 Americans to an opioidÃâà...
Connecticut Magazine
April 13, 2018
“People are becoming addicted every single day in this country because a doctor legally prescribed two to three to four weeks of a prescription opioid that's not necessary,” Mendell says. As many as “1 in 4 people who receive prescription opioids long term for non-cancer pain in primary care settingsÃâà...
ABC News
April 12, 2018
“Long-term use of opioids can be effective in limited, select cases, but beginning and continuing such therapy should be an informed, careful decision,” said Cmdr. Leo Carney, director, Navy Primary Care and Mental Health. “Once it's decided long-term opioid therapy is the best option to promote healthyÃâà...
STAT
March 15, 2018
Although the shortage was not directly caused by the opioid addiction crisis, the response to it is being impaired by some of the legal controls surrounding these drugs. In order to increase the supply of injectable opioids, the Drug Enforcement Administration, which regulates the distribution 8 of controlledÃâà...
BBC News
March 15, 2018
Doctors warn the NHS is fuelling an addiction crisis because of an increase in the prescribing of powerful painkillers. Nearly 24 million opioids, such as morphine, were prescribed in 2017 - equivalent to 2,700 packs an hour. A drugs counsellor and former user told the BBC the NHS was "creating drugÃâà...
The Local Germany
March 15, 2018
Opioids were responsible for just under 800 of the German deaths, as opposed to an estimated 50,000 opioid related deaths in the US. Meanwhile, the number of drug-related deaths has remained stable in Germany in recent years, despite a headline grabbing 15 percent rise between 2015 and 2016.
Politico
March 15, 2018
There were more than 64,000 drug overdose deaths in 2016, mostly involving opioids, according to the most recent federal mortality data. The CDC last week reported that emergency rooms recorded a 30 percent spike in opioid overdoses last summer, indicating that the devastating crisis is worsening.
NPR
March 15, 2018
Several large studies show an increased risk of suicide among drug users addicted to opioids, especially women. In a study of 5 million veterans, women were eight times as likely as others to be at risk for suicide, while men faced a twofold risk. The opioid epidemic is occurring at the same time suicidesÃâà...
CNBC
March 14, 2018
A controversial new study argues that laws expanding access to naloxone, the anti-opioid overdose medication, have increased opioid-related ER visits and theft while doing nothing to curb mortality. The study found opioid-related deaths increased 14 percent in the Midwest after these laws were in effect.
WebMD
March 14, 2018
For decades, medicine's overwhelming response has been prescription opioids like hydrocodone and fentanyl. Retail pharmacies dispensed more than 214 million opioid prescriptions in 2016. That's more than 66 prescriptions for every 100 people and more prescriptions than any other country in theÃâà...
CNBC
March 3, 2018
But he acknowledges that dependency can develop in as little as two weeks, which helps explain why doctors and patients are increasingly viewing opioids as more of a last resort for pain, and looking more seriously at non-opioid treatments. "A foundation of therapy needs to be tried that is comprised ofÃâà...
The Hill
March 3, 2018
From 2010 to 2015, annual overdose deaths involving opioids increased nearly 57 percent, largely due to the spike in use of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids. Of the 42,000 opioid overdose deaths in 2016, 19,400 were linked to synthetic opioids, making those the deadliest opioids for the first time.
NPR
March 3, 2018
These hypersensitive patients often had a history of using opioids. Shouldn't these patients be less susceptible to pain, instead of more so? As I looked into it, I found that I was far from the first to notice the paradox of heightened pain sensitivity with opioid use. An English physician in 1870 reported onÃâà...
NPR
March 2, 2018
In 2016, the most recent year for which data are available, opioid-related overdoses killed more than 42,000 Americans. That's an average of 115 deaths every day. Last November the president's commission on opioids released a lengthy set of recommendations, and most remain a work in progress orÃâà...
NPR
March 2, 2018
In 2016, the most recent year for which data are available, opioid-related overdoses killed more than 42,000 Americans. That's an average of 115 deaths every day. Last November, the president's commission on opioids released a lengthy set of recommendations, and most remain a work in progress orÃâà...
STAT
March 2, 2018
awmakers in Kentucky are weighing whether to impose a new tax on opioid prescriptions, the latest effort in a string of so-far failed attempts to pull new revenue from the painkillers that helped seed a nationwide addiction crisis 1. The proposed tax 2 — a 25-cent levy on drug distributors for every dose sentÃâà...
NPR
March 1, 2018
Opioids are on the White House agenda Thursday — President Trump plans to talk with members of his administration about the crisis. Meanwhile, all around the United States, state legislators, treatment providers, families and many others will be listening. The administration's other opioid efforts have,Ãâà...
NPR
March 1, 2018
The White House is convening a summit today on the nation's opioid crisis. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that overdoses kill an average of 115 Americans every day. And the rising addiction rate is blamed for reducing life expectancy, also costing the U.S. economy more than aÃâà...
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opioids
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