On the recordJune 23, 2016
The Senator and I will both concede that there are people with chronic, acute pain who need relief every single day, and we are not quarrelling with that, that it should be prescribed and there is a definite need. Pain is an issue in the lives of many people, and we need to deal with it responsibly, in medically responsible ways. I guess the question that comes to mind is, when I ask my local doctors in Illinois about this, some have shown extraordinary leadership--the Chicago Medical Society, for example. I commend them. I have written to all the medical associations saying: What are you doing in training your doctors to know when they are prescribing too much or too many pills? I give special credit to the Chicago Medical Association. They have stepped up and said: With our members, we are educating them. But this is what I hear repeatedly, and I would like the Senator's response to it. Three percent of the doctors are responsible for 50 percent of the prescriptions. That is probably true. I can't quarrel with it, nor would I. But then someone said: But that is not the whole story. Many times a person going to one of the 97 percent of physicians ends up starting down the path toward opioid addiction, and then that first physician says ``No more,'' and then they turn to the 3 percent who are just doling out the prescriptions right and left.…
