11.5 million US residents take opioids without medical advice

In 2015, nearly 40 percent of Americans received (91.8 million) prescription opioid drugs. Of these, one in eight reported taking the opioid without doctor's prescription, in larger amounts, or for longer than the doctor recommended (11.5 million). Abuse was primarily mentioned when patients obtained the prescription from friends and relatives (around 50 percent). Most often, those affected indicate that they want to relieve physical pain with it. Ten percent wanted to relax, another ten percent wanted to get high.

One in 50 also believed that the pain medication had led to disorder, such as addiction. The authors therefore assume that 0.8 percent of all US citizens are opioid dependent. 13.8 percent of addicts received opioids from drug dealers.

Opioid abuse and addiction mainly occurred in adults who were not insured, were unemployed, had low income or had behavioral health problems. In the editorial for the study, Karen E. Lasser of the Boston Medical Center appeals to clinicians and policymakers to consider the underlying social problems. She also criticized the fact that the cause of pain could not be discussed in 15-minute conversation with the doctor. Prescribing an opioid is the easiest option to quickly offer patients solution without considering other therapy options.

The current one also explicitly refers to drug deaths from opioids: According to this, 80 percent of victims succumbed to the consequences of an overdose of cocaine or opioids. According to EU Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos, new synthetic opioids are particularly worrying, which is why fentanyls are under special observation. In 2013, US authorities detected illegally manufactured fentanyl in confiscated drugs in 1,015 cases. The following year there were already 5,343 cases.