STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Monday, 4 April 2016

[Tansy_Gold]

1. The billionnaire family behind the addiction epidemic

http://usuncut.com/news/sackler-family-oxycontin-clan-overdose-epidemic/

The OxyContin clan has destroyed more lives than Martin Shkreli, but they prefer you not know their name.



News
Meet the Secretive Family Making Billions From America’s Painkiller Overdose Epidemic
Lacey McLaughlin and C. Robert Gibson | December 30, 2015

The OxyContin clan has destroyed more lives than Martin Shkreli, but they prefer you not know their name.
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If you’re looking for the root cause of the prescription painkiller addiction crisis sweeping the nation, you’ll have to look at one of the wealthiest families in the world you’ve probably never heard of. This year Forbes named the the Sackler family, the owners of Purdue Pharma (maker of OxyContin), on its list of America’s Richest Families, with an estimated net worth of $14 billion.

Prescription painkillers like OxyContin are so powerful that the state of Kentucky sued Purdue Pharma in 2014, seeking $1 billion in damages due to a widespread addiction epidemic that created a residual wave of crime as addicts willing to do anything to afford their next fix committed robberies, theft, and violent crimes. According to the Bowling Green Daily News, Kentucky ranks in the top 5 states with the most painkiller prescriptions. In Kentucky, there are 128 painkiller prescriptions for every 100 adults.

The Sacklers are behind a nationwide effort to stop any and all legislation aimed at slowing down the prescription of highly-addictive painkillers like OxyContin, one of the strong painkillers which killed 16,000 Americans in 2013. In fact, 4 times as many Americans died from prescription painkiller overdose in 2013 than in 1999, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Additionally, the CDC discovered that in 2012, doctors wrote 259 million prescriptions for opioid-based pain relievers. That’s enough for every American adult to have a bottle of painkillers at their disposal.

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Lots of links in the original, from Dec. 2015.