Misdiagnosing the Opioid Crisis – InsideSources

Misdiagnosing the Opioid Crisis – InsideSources:
"As a doctor, nobody wants to see a reduction in deaths from opioid overdoses more than me.
But a condition cannot be treated without making the right diagnosis.
Policymakers in Washington and in state capitals are misdiagnosing the opioid crisis as a doctor-patient problem. 
Their policies are coming between doctors and patients.
They are preventing doctors from using their judgment and expertise to ease pain and suffering.
They are making many patients suffer needlessly, with some turning in desperation to the black market.
...While raids on black market drug dealers continue to net hauls from a seemingly endless sea of diverted, smuggled or counterfeit prescription opioids and heroin, policymakers can’t shake free of the myth that the opioid crisis is caused by doctors prescribing opioids to their patients in pain.
The numbers show that isn’t the case.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in July that prescriptions of opioids by health care practitioners have continued their steady decline since 2010..."
Read on!