USA. Big pharma executives mocked ‘pillbillies’ in emails, West Virginia opioid trial hears
USA. Big pharma executives mocked ‘pillbillies’ in emails, West Virginia opioid trial hears
Executives at one of the US’s largest drug distributors circulated rhymes and emails mocking “hillbillies” who became addicted to opioid painkillers even as the company poured hundreds of millions of pills into parts of Appalachia at the heart of America’s opioid epidemic.
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One email in 2011 included a rhyme built around “a poor mountaineer” named Jed who “barely kept his habit fed”. According to the verse, “Jed” travels to Florida to buy “Hillbilly Heroin”, the nickname for OxyContin, the drug manufactured by Purdue Pharma which kickstarted an epidemic that has claimed more than 500,000 lives. (Guardian, UK, 16.05.2021)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/16/amerisourcebergen-pillbillies-emails-west-virginia-opioid-trial-