# Reprinted with permission by the Cato Institute. The original article can be found here.
A new study reported in the November 1, 2019 Annals of Emergency Medicine pours more cold water on the false but persistent narrative that the opioid overdose crisis was caused by doctors prescribing opioids to patients in pain.
This prospective cohort study by researchers in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Albert Einstein College of Medicine followed 484 “opioid naïve” patients prescribed opioids for acute pain upon release from the emergency department during a six month period. The statewide prescription drug monitoring program was employed in addition to regular follow up telephone interviews. One percent (five patients) met the criteria for persistent opioid use by the end of the follow up period. Four of the five patients still had moderate or severe pain in the affected body part six months after release from the emergency department.
The study comes after a much larger retrospective cohort study reported in the BMJ of more than 568,000 opioid naïve patients prescribed opioids for acute postoperative pain between 2008 and 2016. Investigators found a total misuse rate of 0.6 percent. The researchers defined “misuse” as follows:
The primary outcome was an ICD-9 (international classification of diseases, ninth revision) diagnosis code of opioid dependence, abuse, or overdose…Opioid misuse was defined as the presence of at least one of these ICD codes after discharge and encompasses a composite of a wide range of forms of misuse. We included only diagnosis codes related specifically to prescription opioids.
As previously reported here and here, there is no correlation between opioid prescription volume and non‐medical use or opioid use disorder among persons age 12 and over. But policymakers and law enforcement continue to pressure health care practitioners into undertreating patients in pain. At a recent international breast cancer conference experts stated the under‐prescribing of opioids to breast cancer patients in the U.S. is now comparable to treatment in third world countries.
Recently the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in a written clarification, stated that policymakers and legislators are misapplying and misinterpreting its 2016 opioid prescribing guidelines. The CDC statement pointed out that its guidelines were never intended to be “prescriptive,” but were meant to serve as a rule of thumb, recognizing that providers know their patients’ situations best, and should weigh risks and benefits when treating individuals in pain.
Despite the recent exhortation from the CDC, most states and many pharmacies maintain the limits on the dose and number of opioids that can be prescribed to patients that were put into effect in response to the 2016 CDC guidelines.
Meanwhile, as prescription volume precipitously drops, the overdose rate continues apace, with fentanyl and heroin now making up the overwhelming majority of overdose deaths. And now methamphetamine is making a comeback as a major cause of drug deaths—15 years after Congress addressed the “meth crisis’ with the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act.
Until the war on drugs comes to an end and the focus shifts to harm reduction, the only thing that will change going forward will be the particular drug responsible for the latest “overdose crisis.” That should be the narrative.
Jeffrey Singer
Jeffrey A. Singer is a senior fellow at the Reason Foundation, where he focuses on health care policy and drug policy. He is President Emeritus and founder of Valley Surgical Clinics, Ltd., Arizona's oldest and largest private group surgical practice. From 2017 to 2026, he served as a senior fellow in the Cato Institute's Department of Health Policy Studies and as a Visiting Fellow at the Goldwater Institute. Singer is a member of the Board of Scientific Advisors of the American Council on Science and Health and serves on the expert panel for Doctors for Drug Policy Reform. From 1994 to 2016, he was a regular contributor to Arizona Medicine, the journal of the Arizona Medical Association. He served on the Advisory Board Council of the Center for Political Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University from 2014 to 2018. His writings have appeared in peer-reviewed medical and scientific journals, as well as in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, USA Today, The Hill, and National Review. He has been a guest on national and local television and radio. Singer received his BA from Brooklyn College (City University of New York) and his MD from New York Medical College. He is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons.
