There is a huge problem with prescription medications in Canada. There are a large number of overdoses each year and people are getting prescriptions left right and center without an actual medical problem. They take drugs like OxyContin to get high, and sometimes the results are deadly. If a doctor cuts a patient off, the patient can then perform what is known as “doctor shopping” in order to get their fix. If that doesn’t work then they can always find their opioid of choice on the streets. Here is the problem. Like other synthetic substances like speed and ecstasy, pharmaceuticals that are sold on the street are now being cut with a combination of unknown and possibly lethal ingredients. If the drug OxyContin wasn’t dangerous enough, you now have to worry about the potency and the mysterious ingredients it’s being cut with, probably with the goal to make it cheaper to produce. This new information comes from a pair of overdoses that lead to the deaths of two men in Saskatoon. The CBC report says that it is possible that two men who died of drug overdoses may have ingested “counterfeit” OxyContin that contained deadly ingredients, according to police. The police are still investigating the deaths of the men, who were both in their 20s. The deaths are considered linked due to the fact that they died one day apart and the fact that both men knew each other. During their investigation the police discovered pills known as OxyContin 80. But since that substance is not readily available, police believe the pills were counterfeit and may have been lethal.
“Instead of OxyContin, the pills may contain other unknown deadly ingredients,” police said in a statement on the case Monday. A number of agencies are working on the case, including police from the drug enforcement team and the office of the coroner for Saskatchewan. Police were also warning people about the illicit drugs and the potential danger. The pills were described as round convex in shape, blue/green in colour with the number 80 stamped on one side and the letters CDN on the other.
Those at risk of abusing OxyContin or another form of prescription opioid should take this tragic story very seriously. Drug abuse itself brings very real danger upon those suffering from the disease of addiction, but if you can’t readily identify the pill you are about to swallow or melt down and inject, you should avoid the suspicious substance all together. That being said, we all know that a drug addiction is a constant struggle, and if someone can’t find their drug of choice from a medical professional they will seek out their fix on the streets. Ultimately the only way to prevent more tragedies like the one in this CBC story is to receive help as soon as you believe you have a problem, or in the case of families, when you believe your family member may have a problem. By the time you or your loved one are willing to risk death by taking tainted street versions of your medication, it may be too late to intervene on behalf of that person. That is why the best strategy when dealing with an addict on the verge of risking their health for their next high is to confront them and arrange some sort of treatment plan for them in order to get them the professional help they need in order to turn things around and avoid the obviously lethal street drugs with unknown chemical properties.