According to the Center For Disease Control and Prevention in 2013 there were 10,076 deaths due to alcohol related traffic accident (cdc). Also according to the CDC in that same year there were 22,767 deaths due to prescription drug overdoses. Of these overdoses 16,235 were from opioid painkillers and 6,973 were benzodiazepines also known as sedative/muscle relaxants (cdc). Why is it that drunk driving fatalities seem to garner more attention nation wide that prescription drug overdoses do? You would think that the one with the higher death toll would attract more attention, would you not? Yet each year it seems that this tragic loss of life due to prescription drug overdoses hardly receives any attention. Could it be that it is just too difficult
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Meadows writes “ Ray had convinced herself that abusing prescription drugs was safer than abusing heroin, marijuana, and other “street drugs.” “I would never do those,” she says. I figured I had a prescription for what i was doing, which made it OK” (Meadows para. 7). In other words some people don 't view the abuse of prescription drugs as bad as the abuse of illicit street drugs because a doctor has prescribed and it was purchased legally so it must be safe. Those individuals and friends or family members who know about the problem think that just because it was prescribed by a doctor who should have the best of intentions when it comes to your health and because it was manufactured by a major pharmaceutical company who is mostly likely strictly regulated to make sure the drugs you are taking are manufactured correctly that everything must be ok. But that doesn 't mean that there is not a serious health hazard associated with it, afterall it still is an addictive drug that has the potential to kill you if it is not taken properly. Once people stop viewing an addiction as ok just because the drugs are prescribed by a doctor than we can start realizing that there is a serious issue at hand and if it is not addressed properly it could end up costing …show more content…
After all as stated earlier, prescription drug overdoses kills more people each year that drunk driving does. Just because it is not viewed as bad as illicit drugs that doesn 't mean it is not having a terrible effect on our society. For all the money being made on the purchase of prescription drugs there should be more of an effort by pharmaceutical companies and government agencies as well to help bring more awareness and other treatment options for people who are struggling with this potentially deadly addiction. Afterall, if we don 't do something now the death toll will continue to rise each year and by then it might be too big of a problem to deal with that we will no longer be able to just sweep it under the
Meadows writes “ Ray had convinced herself that abusing prescription drugs was safer than abusing heroin, marijuana, and other “street drugs.” “I would never do those,” she says. I figured I had a prescription for what i was doing, which made it OK” (Meadows para. 7). In other words some people don 't view the abuse of prescription drugs as bad as the abuse of illicit street drugs because a doctor has prescribed and it was purchased legally so it must be safe. Those individuals and friends or family members who know about the problem think that just because it was prescribed by a doctor who should have the best of intentions when it comes to your health and because it was manufactured by a major pharmaceutical company who is mostly likely strictly regulated to make sure the drugs you are taking are manufactured correctly that everything must be ok. But that doesn 't mean that there is not a serious health hazard associated with it, afterall it still is an addictive drug that has the potential to kill you if it is not taken properly. Once people stop viewing an addiction as ok just because the drugs are prescribed by a doctor than we can start realizing that there is a serious issue at hand and if it is not addressed properly it could end up costing …show more content…
After all as stated earlier, prescription drug overdoses kills more people each year that drunk driving does. Just because it is not viewed as bad as illicit drugs that doesn 't mean it is not having a terrible effect on our society. For all the money being made on the purchase of prescription drugs there should be more of an effort by pharmaceutical companies and government agencies as well to help bring more awareness and other treatment options for people who are struggling with this potentially deadly addiction. Afterall, if we don 't do something now the death toll will continue to rise each year and by then it might be too big of a problem to deal with that we will no longer be able to just sweep it under the