I was naively puzzled for a long time about how people got addicted to painkillers – what was so enjoyable about having pain numbed? – until I tried Vicodin.
It was prescribed after a minor operation last year and I suddenly discovered the alluring qualities of pills such as Vicodin and Percocet that combine opiates with paracetamol. After a day or two of pleasurable wooziness, I thought it would be wise to stop.
I seem to have come late to the party, to judge by the possibility that the Food and Drugs Administration in the US may ban such combination of painkillers and narcotics because of the risk of liver damage.
It turns out that the risky quality of Vicodin and the like is not, as you might expect, the potentially addictive narcotics but the large quantities of acetaminophen, or paracetamol, they contain.
The move is part of a broader attempt to crackdown on the over-use of pain-killers such as Tylenol, the main branded form of acetaminophen in the US. As the Wall Street Journal notes today, dosages of pain-killers have been rising as manufacturers produce more “extra-strength” varieties.
You only have to visit a pharmacy in the US – or indeed elsewhere – to see the proliferation of painkillers for every possible ailment, from toothache to headache. It seems that innovation in over-the-counter medicines may be having some nasty side-effects.
Combinations of narcotics and painkillers are prescription medicines but a lot of people use them for chronic joint and back pain. If the FDA follows its advisory panel’s advice, they may have at least to take opiates and painkillers separately in future.
