Conway supports, P'Pool opposes meds-for-meth law; Conway defends decsion not to join lawsuits about federal health reform

In a debate where most of the sparks flew over often-specious questions about conflicts of interest, one of the biggest substantive disagreements between the candidates for attorney general Monday night was about whether to require a prescription for the cold medicine used to make methamphetamine. They also debated President Obama's health-care reform law.

Democratic Attorney General Jack Conway. left, said he supports such a law, which failed in this year's General Assembly, while Hopkins County Attorney Todd P'Pool, right, said he opposes it. The candidates were interviewed by Bill Goodman on KET's "Kentucky Tonight" as part of a series of debates between statewide candidates in the Nov. 8 election.

Republican P'Pool, the first to respond to Goodman's question, said he opposes making pseudoephedrine a scheduled drug because "I think it creates a burden for law-abiding citizens. . . . Let's don’t put a burden on soccer moms." He said he would support "a lifetime ban," which he did not explain, "for anyone convicted of a meth crime."

Conway said his position in favor of scheduling "is not the most politically popular position," but said he responded to a plea from "my friend Hal Rogers," the Republican congressman from Somerset who is a leading advocate. "I know it's not popular with some soccer moms," Conway said, and "I know it's inconvenient" to require a prescription, "but when you see a kid in a burn unit that’s gone through a meth lab it tears your heart." He said children at present at 80 percent of meth labs.

Conway said he is open to changing his position if opponents can show him how to prevent "smurfing," the use of surrogates to avoid the recordkeeping of pseudoephedrine purchases. He said many drug stories do not use the online recordkeeping system. He added that Oregon and Mississippi had "dramatic declines" in the number of meth labs after they scheduled pseudoephedrine.

P'Pool began the debate by sharply criticizing Conway's decision not to join lawsuits by Republican attorneys general challenging the constitutionality of the federal health-reform law: "He's absent form the fight against Obamacare … because he supports Barack Obama and his re-election." Conway replied, "I'm not gonna take some of the valuable resourecs of the office of the attorney general and put 'em on a lawsuit on health care when it’s an issue that’s gonna get decided anyway." He said some attorneys general are supporting the law in court, and "I didn’t join them either because I wanted to focus on Kentucky first."

As Goodman pressed the point, P'Pool said, "It’s really not about health care; it's about the proper role of the federal government." He said Kentucky could join the case with the stroke of a pen, but "My opponent has not been bashful in his support of Barack Obama and that’s why he’s on the sidelines."

Conway replied that the lawsuit "might undo some of the underpinning" of Social Security and Medicare laws. "This is not a perfect bill; some things need to be fixed in health-care reform," he said, but he implicitly defended the bill's requirement to buy health insurance: "It costs Americans on average $46 billion a year to cover the uninsured," he said. "They’re going to the emergency room to get their care … They’re already in the market. This is about being more efficient."

Click here for a story on the debate by Deborah Yetter of The Courier-Journal. Video of the debate is posted online here.

Directory listing 2,500 substance-abuse treatment resources in Kentucky released; every county has at least one facility

There are 2,500 resources for substance abuse treatment in Kentucky, with at least one in each county, research at the University of Kentucky has found.

"In addition to the 345 state-certified substance abuse treatment providers listed in the directory, the peer- and faith-based resources it includes can be just as important for getting someone back on the road to recovery," said Van Ingram, executive director of the Kentucky Office for Drug Control Policy.

The 2011 Kentucky Substance Abuse Treatment Provider Directory is available online by clicking here and can also be obtained by sending an e-mail to michael.childress@uky.edu. The directory is the result of a collaborative effort between Foundation for Healthy Kentucky, which funded the project, the University of Kentucky's College of Communications and Information Studies and UK's Center for Business and Economic Research.

Nationwide, 23.5 million Americans 12 and up needed treatment for drugs or alcohol abuse in 2009, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. About 8 percent of 12+ Kentuckians used illicit drugs and 21 percent were binge alcohol drinkers in the past month, SAMHSA reports. On one day in March 2009, there were more than 19,000 people in Kentucky's substance abuse treatment facilities for either drug or alcohol abuse or both, the 2009 National Survey of Substance Abuse Treatment Services showed. (Read more)

Former official: DEA failed to slow prescription drug abuse epidemic by not limiting production

At a time when Oxycontin abuse was rapidly increasing, the Drug Enforcement Agency had the power to slow production of the drug and perhaps stave off what is now a prescription drug abuse epidemic in rural areas across the country, reports Guy Taylor of Salon. However, the agency allowed production of Oxycodone, the non-generic form of Oxycontin, to increase by 1,200 percent over a decade.

After the Food and Drug Administration approves a drug for production and sale, a section of the DEA known as the Office of Diversion Control decides how much of a drug can be manufactured. By law, the makers of Oxycodone and its generic forms have to present a quota approval application to Diversion Control. The office decides whether the amount requested can be manufactured. With the help of statistics provided by a former head of Diversion Control, Gene Haislip, Taylor discovered that in 1997 when Purdue Pharma first introduced Oxycontin, it was allowed to make 8.3 tons. This year, the DEA approved the manufacture of 105 tons.

Haislip tells Taylor DEA approved the increase in production in the face of a growing drug abuse epidemic, showing a "serious lack of accountability and oversight." Says Haislip: "The DEA is the lone federal agency with the power to decide how much of the drug gets made and put out there; it alone has had all the responsibility to do something about this problem." He told Taylor the agency should have learned from two examples in the 1970s and 1980s, when Diversion Control reduced quota requests for pill-based amphetamines and Methaqualone, the main ingredient in Quaaludes. When the quotas were reduced, illicit use of those drugs significantly decreased.

Asked why the agency allowed the production quota of Oxycodone to increase so much, DEA supervisory special agent Gary Boggs told Taylor the agency is required to set quotas at a level that "ensures an uninterrupted supply for the legitimate medical and scientific research needs of the United States, and that those needs are always changing as the population grows and as medical science finds different needs for products." He said there are patients who need the drug for medical purposes and the agency cannot limit their access because of those who abuse it.

Taylor opines: "The fact is that the U.S. government has adopted a position on prescription painkillers that differs from its policy toward other controlled substances such as cocaine, heroin and marijuana: Unlike those drugs, the DEA says limiting the supply of the prescription painkillers will not reduce abuse." He reports the agency's lack of oversight in the production of Oxycodone is "perplexing" to state and local governments now battling prescription pill abuse crises in their areas. Ohio Department of Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services director Orman Hall told Taylor the "the loss of life and the carnage associated" with prescription drug abuse could have been prevented had the DEA limited the production of Oxycodone. (Read more)

New Florida laws helping stem flow of pills, but loopholes remain and trade is shifting to other states

Though pill mills continue to be a big problem in Florida, where lax laws have fueled Kentucky's prescription pill trade, there is evidence that the tides are slowly turning in the Sunshine State. "Registered pain clinics in Florida have dropped from 930 last year to 736 now as the state begin to crack down," reports Laura Ungar of The Courier-Journal in the second installment of a special report on prescription drug abuse. (C-J photo by Kylene Lloyd: Broward County Detective Brann Redl)

A Florida law that took effect in July increases penalties for physicians who over-prescribe, tightens rules for prescriptions and pain-treatment regimens, and decreases the amount of time dispensers have to report the sale of prescription drugs into an electronic monitoring system that started Sept. 1.

The worry now is pill mill operators may just move to surrounding states. Georgia has seen a surge in clinics. "Each community outside of Atlanta is seeing an increased problem," said John Horn, first assistant U.S. attorney in Georgia, which has no electronic prescription-drug monitoring program. Some Kentucky addicts are heading to Ohio, Tennessee or West Virginia to get their pills, though now an interstate task force is helping to curb those efforts. (Read more)

There is also fear that the new law in Florida contains loopholes. "For example, board-certified pain specialists, such as anesthesiologists and surgeons, are exempt from pain-clinic registration and inspections," Ungar reports. The law also "doesn't require drug testing for patients."

But there are efforts on the national level by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency to stem the problem. Operation Pill Nation, launched in 2010, resulted in the DEA and other agencies making 340 undercover buys from more than 60 doctors working in more than 40 clinics in the first nine months of the operation. "The first arrests came in late February, when 22 people were picked up in one day," Ungar reports. A Florida strike force that started in March resulted in 937 arrests, including 17 doctors, and the confiscation of more than 250,000 pills.

There is also evidence that state drug monitoring systems work because they are a "major deterrent to doctor-shopping and a main reason Kentuckians go to Florida for drugs," Ungar reports.(Read more)

Mental Accuity & Focus - Not just a concern for seniors

Phosphatidylserine is used for Alzheimer's disease, age-related decline in mental function, improving thinking skills in young people, attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), depression, preventing exercise induced stress, and improving athletic performance.

How does it work?

Phosphatidylserine is an important chemical with widespread functions in the body. It is part of the cell structure and is key in the maintenance of cellular function, especially in the brain. 

 

Mental Accuity & Focus

CogniCare™ provides a comprehensive cognitive support for neurotransmitters, focus, mental acuity and mood. Each capsule contains the following healthy brain complexes:

NeuroTransmitter Complex™

Ultimate Focus Complex™
ProAcuity & Mood Complex™

NeuroTransmitter™ Complex- the key to healthy brain activity. Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers that enable neurons to pass signals to each other and thus allow the body to function properly. Electrical signals are converted to chemical signals at the synapse. This is known as neurotransmission at a synapse. Healthy neurotransmitter activity is essential in proper brain brain function.

The nutrients included in NeuroTransmitter Complex™, and their respective brain support roles are:

Huperzine A - prevents acetylcholine breakdown, one of the body's essential neurotransmitters. This offers the body healthy cognitive performance support.

L-Glutamine - modulates both excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmitters. As it is highly concentrated in the brain and balances other transmitters, L-Glutamine allows the brain to perform in a healthy state.

L-Tyrosine - plays important role in the production of neurotransmitters which regulate emotions.

Phosphatidyl Serine - modulates the fluidity of cell membranes --- essential for sending and receiving messages. Increases communication between cell membranes by increasing the number of membrane receptor sites for receiving messages. Promotes a healthy brain supply of and output of acetylcholine.

Ultimate Focus Complex™
Acetyl L-Carnitine - a neuroprotective nutrient that passes through the blood-brain barrier. Its neuroprotection is derived from its ability to stop the passage of harmful substances into the brain. Acetyl L-Carnitine is a natural inflammatory that enhances the effects of antioxidant systems within the body. It advances the body’s ability to fight oxidative stress. It is essential in maintaining healthy mitochondrial activity, and promoting healthy glutathione and CoQ10 levels. Acetyl L-Carnitine also works synergestically with alpha lipoic acid, another powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory.

Vinpocetine - promotes healthy blood circulation within the brain.

ProAcuity & Mood Complex™
B-12 (methylcobalamin) - promotes healthy mental acuity and mood function.

B-6 - supports normal memory and verbal function.

30 Day Supply

Testimonials:
"When I told my mom that I was having trouble with concentration and focus in school, my mom recommended CogniCare. I was pleasantly surprised to find that one of the best ingredients that I have been able to find through independent research is phosphatidylserine. It is one of the best supplements that you can take in the realm of mental enhancers. Not only was I able to notice an increased ability in the way I manage stress in my daily life, but I was also more and more emotionally stable. In lecture, my ability for taking notes was also enhanced, and I was soon enjoying the perks of a superior short-term memory. Overall, CogniCare is a revolutionary supplement. Its combination of phosphatidylserine with its other ingredients like Vinpocetine, and Huperzine A, enables the supplement to work synergistically for a noticeable improvement in executive function. Thank you for the opportunity to share my experience with others who may be looking for a natural and effective way of clearing the cobwebs from their brains." Fred, Neuroscience Undergraduate Major, UC Berkeley, CA

Suggested Use:
As a dietary supplement, take two capsules twice per day with meals or as directed by your health care professional.

Cautions
If you have low blood pressure, have a history of heart problems, strokes or are using blood-thinning medications, AChE inhibitors, glaucoma or bipolar medications,consult your doctor before using this product. For adult use only. Not for use by pregnant, may become pregnant, or breastfeeding women.

* These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.