Anyone watching Dopesick? (title edited by MNHQ at request of OP)

[Biggfarmer]

So I've been watching this on iplayer (about the opioid scandal/catastrophe in the US) and so many things seem to relate to what has happened with puberty blockers - obviously the huge money involved for invested companies, the overly simplistic charts which are used to get people to agree they feel like that, the language used to plough through safeguarding/good doctors, the constantly staying ahead of people trying to stop it, the fight back and chaos when the pharmaceutical company realises people realise it's not all cool... It's so depressing, anyone else had a similar feeling? I know some of this is how pharmaceutical companies operate and always have, but the striking thing with this is that they know they can get away with this because the US doesn't have the regulations of Europe (specifically Germany in this), but with puberty blockers that doesn't seem to have stopped anyone (until now [UK]). Any thoughts welcome (it's an excellent series either way 😬, Michael Keaton is great)

Yes!! I've just finished watching it and I thought it was excellent too. Great writing and filming, brilliant characters especially Michael Keaton and Kaitlyn Dever.

Everything you mentioned and more - the money, the charts, the language, the railroading of doctors and those who challenged it, the corporate deceit, the sell sell sell mentality, the hushing up of negative effects and the fightback - it would all be unbelievable if it weren't true.

My knowledge of the details of this scandal were pretty vague before I watched the series but the whole situation is so shocking. I also used to think that people who went on about big pharma were conspiracy theory nutters (and no doubt many of them are) but after watching this I really do understand how American pharmaceutical companies get their hooks into people and create a market. And yes, I can clearly see the parallels with puberty blockers and other gender-related drugs. Creating a market by telling people there's something wrong with them for which medication is the answer.

I also watched The Crime of The Century straight after which is a 2-part documentary about the opioid crisis. Shocking but excellent as well. I recommend it (Now TV, HBO).

(You should ask MN to move this post to S&G as it's busier and you'll get more of a response there.)

Thanks for the recommendation, I'll have a look! It does seem so baffling that companies can operate like this, and it's assumed they are doing so for the patients' good, just taken at their word. I'm sure there will always be people happy to fill a gap in the market like this, but the way they were able to lie to, bully and bend those who the public trust and go to is chilling.

And I have asked for it to be moved now, thanks!

Thanks OP. Have just started watching it, and yes. Parallels definitely seen.
This talk from the Denver Genspect conference covers this too. Thought you might find interesting to watch as a follow on:

Oh fascinating, thank you!

The whole series had me really shaken. I had no idea it could be so easy to be so cavalier with the health of the public. Quietly grateful to the German medical association that didn't want to know about opioids and how that kept the products out of Europe.

Yes exactly DH is convinced he would have come a cropper on them due to back pain he had that is no longer an issue

I watched the last episode last night. Brilliant series, heartbreaking and absolutely chilling.

Actually OxyContin is available in the UK and can be a useful alternative for patients with severe pain due to cancer who would usually have Morphine but can’t for other medical reasons (kidney problems usually).

That’s not to say the UK doesn’t have its issues with abuse of prescription medication but the regulatory framework and the way medical students and doctors are trained in evidence based medicine and critical appraisal is different in the USA, as is the culture of how medicine is practiced. I have often been struck by the fact that aside from all the ethical aspects of not having universal healthcare for all, the lack of a National health service means such variability in practice and standards.

I also watched it on iPlayer and thought the same thing. Do you remember the Barbie-GI Joe scale, the chart distributed to schools and used by Mermaids to tell children whether they were girls or boys? Purdue used the same idea (a pain chart distributed to hospitals etc) to push the use of OxyContin.

Oh interesting Faffertea, I didn't know that, but yes maybe a difference is in the groundwork of evidence based medicine as you say. Yes that's the one misscockerspaniel!

Was this on Netflix / prime or was that something else about the subject?

Either way, yes the parallels are extremely obvious.

On this subject of parallels, I randomly stumbled on this heartbreaking story of Evy Mages. She was adopted as a child and not treated very well, mainly as she was clearly quite a Tom boy and struggling with lack of affection. Was sent to an institution which was a lot worse as the psychologist in charge was trained under nazi Germany.

Everything was geared towards changing these vulnerable children who didn't fit the mould.

They were regularly injected with an experimental drug that was otherwise used in cows in heat - essentially a type of hormone blocker.

It wasn't tested in humans at all; these children were the test subjects.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct5nxl

I haven't checked yet but it's absolutely the type of story I expect to see from Malcolm Clark.

I think it's just on iPlayer and Disney, so that may have been something else - I think I saw a documentary ages ago but this is a dramatisation. Thanks for another recommendation WarriorN, it's all unbelievable isn't it

One of the things Purdue did was to recruit supposedly independent experts to endorse their product and to say that opioid addiction was a myth, there was no risk of long-term addiction from taking medical opioids etc. They also pushed the idea of a community of people in chronic pain who were suffering as a result of being denied life-transforming drugs. All very familiar.

Thanks, yes it was painkiller on Netflix, last year

www.netflix.com/gb/title/81095069?s=i&trkid=0&vlang=en

I watched this recently, thought it was amazing. Horrifying but amazing!

I was then doing a bit of reading re a health condition I have, which requires to be treated with pain killers. I was on a reputable website, to the best of my knowledge, and it mentioned that "sufferers may experience breakthrough pain"! Did I misunderstand this, or was this a made up term?

Oh wow, I think I need to research that, I saw it as their made up term so...hmm... wonder if the term has crossed over into medicine or if it was already there

Started watching

Early line:

"You don't chase the market you create it."

Aka Pride month. Inclusion and diversity. Twaw. Trans joy.

It's chilling to watch. I knew a lot of medical students around 1995-2000 and they were often being taken out for big dinners by pharmaceutical companies.

I was also gaslit about the non side effects and non addictiveness of seroxat around the same time, but couldn't come off the damn stuff for a long time. (Was put on it before they checked bloods for other health conditions which is what eventually was found to be 'the issue.')

I watched it when it came to Disney with my mouth open in shock and horror and was immensely grateful for NICE.

there was also significant overlap between pharmaceutical companies who made opioids and did Covid vaccines, so I could understand why so many Americans, particularly in communities hollowed out by opioids, were so desperately skeptical about the vaccines and the “reassurances”.

Demon Copperhead is an excellent story around the impacts of the opioid crisis in rural Kentucky.

Yes WarriorN, the non side effects thing, i saw a pro puberty blockers video which very lightly acknowledged all the bone damage and brain delay and then at the end posed its own question, "so have they been shown to be harmful? No!" I haven't even finished the series yet, but there are some chilling lines coming up.

That's food for thought about the push back on covid vaccines HermioneWeasley, very interesting. Oh the damage they do. I'm sure there are good pharmaceutical people out there! But the big bucks, the dinners, it's bound to lead to this isn't it

I can sort of see your point but to me the issues are very different the opioid crisis was caused by misleading evidence motivated by greed. puberty blockers are not licensed the way use has always been restricted in the wider NHS and never seen as ‘mainstream’. Maybe the ideology is attempting this but I don’t think they have been successful clinically in convincing people like Purdue pharmacy were.

I mean to say, I know there are good pharmaceutical people out there, thanks for the cancer cures people! But there's a lot of murky ground out there too.

I can only say anecdotally, but I know several young people on them and doctors who are unhappy prescribing them. But the young people/children knew their right to informed consent so demanded them.

"In 1990, Portenoy and Hagen published an article about a specific pain syndrome that is known as “irruptive pain”, or by the term “breakthrough pain”."
Dr Russell Portenoy is the "doctor who led the charge for mass prescribing of opioids in the US, and was then paid by Purdue Pharma to help drive sales of OxyContin".
So that term seems to have stemmed from this and is in use today. It may be a helpful term, I'm not medical, I don't know, but it's origin seems to have been used by Purdue to drive sales.

I don't know about this. Canada has a system very much like the NHS but also had similar problems with opioids to the US.