Ontario tracks drug fraud
Ottawa Citizen
... painkillers such as OxyContin -- commonly known as hillbilly heroin -- and Percocet, ... Ontario has the highest rate of narcotics use in Canada. ...
Ontario announces new prescription database to curb abuse, addiction
Ottawa Citizen
... is designed to counter abuse of narcotic painkillers such as OxyContin and Percocet, ... Ontario has the highest rate of narcotics use in Canada. ...
Our drug priorities need to change
Toronto Sun
... such as OxyContin, and we're gobbling them up faster than ever. ... In Canada, more than 21 million low- to moderate-risk drinkers account for 40% to ...
PETITION TO BAN OXYCONTIN
OxyContin has been implicated in many times more U.S. deaths than caused by 9/11 and the Iraq War combined since Purdue Pharma began producing and selling it in 1995.
But Oxycontin's overdoses and abuse isn't limited to the US. In the late 1990s, Ontario's Chief Coroner, Dr. Barry McLellan, asked that forensic scientists go back and review death files from people with drug overdoses for the past five years. They found that between 1999 and 2003 there had been between a four- and five-fold increase in deaths where Oxycodone had been detected in the blood of the deceased.
Oxycontin Damage: A Timeline
In 2000, The USA based Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) reported a 400% increase in oxycodone related deaths, based on medical examiner and coroner reports.
In 2001, Oxycodone abuse was highly publicized throughout North America.
In 2003, the death toll in Canada mounted as 101 people in Ontario alone died with Oxycodone in their systems -- 10 times more than a decade ago.
OxyContin is molecularly almost identical to and acts in the body in the same manner as heroin.
Heroin began as a widely promoted, legal drug in the United States that was similarly touted as having few addiction risks. The Bayer company stopped manufacturing it in 1913 and our forefathers took dramatic action against its damaging effects almost 100 years ago.
OxyContin is available at any pharmacy, and has become the preferred substitute for heroin on our streets with many tens of thousands now addicted.
OxyContin was approved by the FDA, with Purdue Pharma claiming then and continuing to infer that it's addiction potential is low.
In 2007, Purdue and three top executives of Purdue Pharma pled guilty in Virginia in relation to misleading the public about the addictive qualities and safety of OxyContin and paid fines totaling over $634 million.
But no Purdue Pharma executive went to jail and the FDA has allowed OxyContin to remain on the market.
There are other products as effective as OxyContin at controlling pain but no other legal opioid has the history of misrepresentation, abuse, death and destruction of OxyContin.
OxyContin is a "virus" that started an epidemic of addiction and death that has now infected every community in Canada / America. It is time for the FDA to remove the newest substitute for heroin, OxyContin, from the marketplace.
BAN OXYCONTIN CANADA!!!
OXYCONTIN KILLS
Chad Gregory Gardiner May 7th 1978-May 28th 2004
Click here to add text.
"I think the problem is bigger than most people realize," said Sgt. James Morton, "not just in around the Yorkton-Kamsack area. It's all across Canada right now
http://www.newstalk650.com/story/20110216/47155
Click here to add text.
Click here to add text.
Please Submit Your Story Here
Click here to add text.
OXYCONTIN KILLS
Baring My Soul
WRITTEN by Amanda Ann-Marie Hunter
On Monday, August 9, 2010 at 10:55am
I have decided to write out all of the situations that have made me the person I am today. I figure if I let everyone see what has made me the person I am today it might make it more easier for me to talk to people. This is not for any certain people but for everyone who wants to learn a little more about my secret little world.
I lived my early life not wanting to go to school. Not feeling like I would ever amount to anything because that's what everyone else was telling me. I didn't have many friends and the few I did have turned around and wanted to be like everyone else. I lived my life telling my brother my problems and crying myself to sleep every night wondering what I did to deserve a life like this.
In 1994 I had just started at Princess Anne Public School for french immersion and was actually enjoying making friends everyday. Then on that fateful day in October my brother died and because he was my best friend I was mortified at his passing. I couldn't keep concentration on my studies so I had to go back to my old school where nobody liked me, and if they did they sure knew how to hide it, and my life was total hell with nobody to talk to about it. Leaving Princess Anne meant losing touch with my friends who I have yet to find again today. I found myself hating my life even more and felt that if my only true friend could leave me here all alone then what was the point of staying here myself. Nobody liked me, there was constant fighting at my place and no where to hide from it all. I wanted to die.
I started writing poems hoping that would help me and it did feel very good to get them out on paper but those very few who cared and read the poems were also very scared. I was so far in depression I had no idea how to get out. I found myself grabbing a knife several times to finally end the torture that was my life.
I swear, no lie, I couldn't have done it if it wasn't for my brother. Yes he died, yes he wasn't around but if you believe in guardian spirits then you will understand this. I felt his presence all around me. I felt his arms wrap around me, which I have never felt before. I heard his voice, which I've never heard before. He held me and told me to hold on a little longer. That there was something better for me and I would see it soon. I would see pictures of the good times with him. Helping him draw pictures, playing in the yard to be able to see his face again always made me weak in the knees. I would end up crying and asking him why he left me here all alone with nobody to help me. Nobody who cared enough to really love me. I asked him why he could go be free but I couldn't. All I heard was wait and you'll see, you are not alone good is coming just keep going.
I would drop the knife every time and ball my eyes out. But, again I would keep going forward and then end up back there again. It felt like one step forward, two steps back. Still nobody loved me, still nobody gave me a chance, still nobody gave me the time of day. I was a ghost walking threw the halls of high school. I didn't want to let anyone in because I was afraid that if I did then they would just leave me or stab me in the back. I stifled my flame so that nobody would see me. If anyone did I'm sure their memory of me was when I would cry when they said hello. Everyone thought I was stuck up and because of that nobody wanted to get to know me. When really I was just so scared of everything.
Almost 5 years later in January of 1999 I did find my good thing. I met Brodie. I say he's my good thing because he kept going to see the real me even when I shut him out so many times. He gave me a chance when nobody else really would. He kept edging me to open up when I was so scared. His persistence paid off and my guard feel down quicker then with anyone else. He was straight with me from the start. He never lied to me and even asked me out several times but I still had fears. I was in love with him and I was still to scared to do anything about it. Two years later we finally got together.
We've had our ups and downs like any other couple and there was a huge down when we broke up. But that showed me how to find myself and grow as a person.
In between that time I watched a man so fed up with putting his family threw pain because of an addiction that was mostly caused by his doctor jump from a building and land really close to the car I was driving. My brain couldn't process it right away and made something impossible become the reality. After it finally showed me the real reality I got out of my car to see if there was anything that I could do to help only to find myself staring at him and him trying to stare at me. I have never seen anyone like that and I still see him laying there today. I wonder why I had the help and he didn't. Why I was able to finally make it threw and he wasn't. Sometimes I even wonder why he was able to do it and I wasn't. Not that I would try anymore. My children need me now and I don't feel it would be fair to them if I did something like that.
Because of all my situations, my life events, my lessons, I have learned that life does go on after hardship. Life does get better with time but the past will never leave you by yourself. The people who were there whether they be alive today or gone have helped you on your path and if you think of them in a positive light then that's what makes your life better.
I think of Robbie in a positive light because of his will to live for as long as he could, he showed me how to listen, he showed me how to love and he showed me that even when you've moved on to the next life you can still help those who need it in this life. He also showed me not to care what everyone else thought, and unfortunately I'm learning that one now and not while I was in public school, and to keep moving forward even if it's hard to do so. When life gets tough you have to become strong to keep moving until your destination in there in front of you. Always keep searching for that person, place, thing, feeling that makes you happy.
I think of Chad in a positive light because he showed me that the love for someone else can make you do whatever you feel you need too. Sure he did it in a way that probably wasn't the best choice but because of what he did he was able to show me what I needed to see.
Linda Gardiner is Chad's mother and I met her once. Even though I had verbal diarrhea and hate myself for telling her what no mother really wants to hear of her son's, who had just died, last moments in life. I have felt bad because I couldn't just say that he died instantly, was in no pain and didn't suffer. While talking to her she made me feel like the most important person in her son's life at the time of his passing. I was never seen as someone who could have done any good for anyone else before and she made me feel like me just being there showed him the love he needed to see at that moment. When I left I cried even more. Not only because I felt bad for probably breaking her heart but because nobody had ever said anything like that to me. I was always worthless and nothing but a speck. I wish all these years I didn't feel so guilty for my words so maybe I could have got to know Chad more threw his mother's memory.
This concludes all that makes me who I am. It has taken me a total of about 20 years to experience these situations and about 20 years to get the total lesson from them. I have learned by all my experiences what kind of parent I want to be, how to be strong and how to keep going no matter what anyone thinks. My husband and my children are my today heroes because they are what keeps me strong but these others are the heroes who made me who I am today and taught me how to become the strong person I am.come the strong person I am.
Amanda Ann-Marie Hunter
THANK you Amanda for sharing your story...
Linda
OXYCONTIN KILLS
OXYCONTIN KILLS
