Two major opioid painkiller manufacturers are now involved in a lawsuit filed by Attorney General, Patrick Morrisey. These two manufacturers are pharma giants Mallinckrodt LLC and Endo Health Solutions Inc. and their subsidiaries, Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Par Pharmaceuticals Inc. for Endo and SpecGx LLC for Mallinckrodt. They are being sued for contributing to the opioid crisis in West Virginia by using deceptive marketing practices to misinform prescribers as well as obscure the enormous risks involved in taking opiate painkillers. Exaggerating the medical benefits of these painkillers contributes to the amount of overdoses in West Virginia. I picked this topic because it relates heavily to the impact of opioids on rural geography. States such as West Virginia fall victim to more overdoses due to the idea of stigma and fatalism. These areas continue to suffer because of the stigma that they are doomed to live in these dead end towns forever. #GEOG203 #bio
Oceana, West Virginia, often referred to as 'Oxyana' due to the prevalence of overdoses
