Massachusetts Democratic Senator Edward Markey wants the FDA to rescind its approval of OxyContin for children, and then convene an advisory panel to reconsider the issue.
Senator Markey is well intentioned but misinformed. The FDA is not the problem. The agency has not “willfully blinded itself of the warning signs” of prescription painkillers, as Senator Markey believes.
The “experts” Senator Markey is referring to tell part of the story, but the situation is more complicated than most appreciate. Surely, if Senator Markey knew the whole story, he wouldn’t want to deprive children of painkillers that could ease their extreme suffering. He wouldn’t want children to die in agony while their doctors were forced to stand by and watch them suffer.