Luckily laws and regulations are currently better enforced, and obtaining narcotics online, although possible, is more difficult than it used to be and often also no longer legal. However, when assuming that the information provided in this message is true, the quantity of Hydrocodone related sales in Nevada has been strongly inflated by internet diversion, something which will become visible over the next year when a drop in prescriptions resulting from limited internet sales due to new laws and regulations is likely to be seen.

I will wait and see but without doubt there is a problem with the use of narcotic pain medications. Although it may be possible to ban the sales of narcotics through internet sales, and limit the sales of narcotics through other legit channels, I sincerely doubt for this to provide any solution and think it will only move the problem to something which may be even less desired. Hereby I am thinking of non-prescription drugs which often pushes youth into a criminal environments and relationships. If I was forced to make a choice, I would rather see my kids doctor shopping or buying drugs online, then for them to visit street dealers, or finding them hanging out on the street corners waiting to score. Either way it would be a difficult situation which I hope not to experience...

It is ironic how in other countries meds like Oxycontin are often paid for by the insurance company, yet abuse rates are much lower. Some countries allow the legal use of Marijuana as recreational drug and the amount of addicts is considerably lower, even while quality of the product is better, and therefore expected to be more addictive. Only Americans will be buying prescription drugs online and they have a reason; the health system has failed them and they are unable to get affordable care, weather it is opiate pain management or simple blood pressure medicine, it is cheaper online and we are told not to buy it. Maybe it's time for a structural change... God Bless!

Dan Watson

If I recall correctly, a few years ago a certain internet pharmacy was said to be responsible for dispensing over 3% of the total amount of Hydrocodone dispensed within the entire nation that year. There are also reports on doctors who prescribed outrageous amounts of narcotics in their name, which would only be possible if they were prescribing for an alternative crowd such as through internet prescription mills, who have dominated the online pharmaceutical industry for narcotics for several years in a row...

This was the process where the doctor agreed to issue prescriptions to a few hundred patients daily who had provided medical records, and therefore pre-approved by an online consultation service (regardless if the the patient was legit or not), yet personal data was never verified by the doctor who only cared about his/her commission for each prescription, often automatically issued in his name by an automated system, and making thousands of dollars daily.

QUOTE: "No one can say with certainty why so many narcotic painkillers are used in Nevada"

Although I do not doubt that there are many people in Nevada who use narcotic medications to relieve their pain (just like anywhere else in the USA), I do not trust the statistics if based on the prescribing doctors and dispensing pharmacies within the state, especially Nevada.

As most people know there has been a booming internet industry, that has been dispensing narcotics throughout the U.S. by using real physicians and pharmacies, directly related to the sales of Hydrocodone containing medications to be traced back to a hand full of doctors and pharmacies nationwide over the past years. Some of them happened to be previously active in Nevada, on of the few states where such activity seemed to have concentrated.

As a member of FindRxOnline.com since 2002, I have seen this industry come and go, and am also aware that issued prescriptions and dispensed drugs were frequently issued and dispensed by doctors and pharmacies in one state, while the patients were actually located in different states; something which caused hundreds of thousands of prescriptions to be written and filled within Nevada, while never used by its own population... Another example of similar misleading statistics is to be found in Florida, which is without surprise also rated high on the list...