{"id":577273,"date":"2017-11-01T19:19:31","date_gmt":"2017-11-01T19:19:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/?p=577273"},"modified":"2017-11-01T19:19:31","modified_gmt":"2017-11-01T19:19:31","slug":"the-natural-resource-that-could-end-the-opioid-epidemic-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/?p=577273","title":{"rendered":"The Natural Resource That Could End the Opioid Epidemic"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"opioid<\/a><\/div>\n

By Matthew Carr<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

The numbers are staggering.<\/p>\n

There are more than 100 million Americans who suffer from chronic pain.<\/p>\n

Since the 1990s, opioid painkillers have been the go-to treatment.<\/p>\n

People believed these drugs were not only effective, but also \u201cmagical.\u201d<\/p>\n

But good intentions gave way to an epidemic\u2026 one that’s just been declared a public health crisis by the president.<\/p>\n

In 2014 alone, 7.8 billion pills of hydrocodone (also known as Vicodin) were distributed across the U.S.<\/p>\n

That’s roughly a Vicodin per day for every man, woman and child in the U.S. for a month.<\/p>\n

But that’s not all\u2026<\/p>\n

That same year, 4.9 billion tablets of oxycodone (or Percocet) were handed out.<\/p>\n

It’s an unsettling fact, but the U.S. represents 99.7% of the world’s hydrocodone consumption.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, Americans got addicted. Many eventually moved to more dangerous opioids.<\/p>\n

From 2002 to 2016, the number of deaths from heroin overdoses in the U.S. increased 533%. On average, 91 people die every day from an opioid overdose.<\/p>\n

In recent years, the U.S. government has finally taken action by introducing measures to roll back access to these powerful drugs.<\/p>\n

In 2014, the Drug Enforcement Agency reclassified hydrocodone as a Schedule 2 drug. In 2016, the Centers for Disease Control released new opioid guidelines.<\/p>\n

Thanks to these measures and others, the number of hydrocodone prescriptions is falling\u2026<\/p>\n

This year, the DEA is constricting the supply of hydrocodone by another 25%. The prescription quota is set at 58.4 million.<\/p>\n

That’s a 35% decline from the 90 million prescriptions in 2016 and a 57% decline from 2011.<\/p>\n

In July, the Food and Drug Administration even requested that Endo International (Nasdaq: ENDP) remove its opioid pain medication, Opana ER, from the market<\/p>\n

That’s the first time ever the FDA has ever taken such an action.<\/p>\n

But, as the FDA put it, \u201cWe are facing an opioid epidemic\u2026 a public health crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n

We also saw Ohio, Missouri and Mississippi file lawsuits against Endo \u2013 as well as Allergan (NYSE: AGN), Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Purdue Pharma and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries (NYSE: TEVA).<\/p>\n

The lawsuits allege that the companies engaged in a sustained marketing effort to downplay the addiction risks of opioids.<\/p>\n

For Endo, shares are down more than 60% this year\u2026<\/p>\n

Today, it’s trading at less than $7\u2026 a far cry from the $94 it was trading at in early 2015.<\/p>\n

Endo’s earnings per share swung to a massive loss of more than $15 in 2016.<\/p>\n

Addressing the opioid crisis is a good thing. But it raises an important question: If the government limits opioid prescriptions, where are those 100 million Americans who suffer from chronic pain going to find relief?<\/p>\n

Well, there’s an emerging industry that could swoop in and ease the pain.<\/p>\n

[iu-adbox]
\nNorth America’s Newest Cash Crop
\nA major surge is coming\u2026<\/p>\n

Over the next few years, the global marijuana market will grow to $200 billion.<\/p>\n

That’ll be split between legal recreational use and medical use.<\/p>\n

But the medical side could have even more potential.<\/p>\n

Currently, 29 countries recognize some form of medical marijuana.<\/p>\n

And in the European Union, 12 of the 28 members have medical marijuana programs.<\/p>\n

Plus, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Israel, Jamaica, Mexico, South Africa and many others are looking to legalize medical marijuana or \u2026read more<\/a> <\/p>\n

Source:: Investment You<\/a><\/p>\n

The post <\/a>The Natural Resource That Could End the Opioid Epidemic<\/a> appeared first on Junior Mining Analyst<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Matthew Carr The numbers are staggering. There are more than 100 million Americans who suffer from chronic pain. Since the 1990s, opioid painkillers have been the go-to treatment. People believed these drugs were not only effective, but also \u201cmagical.\u201d But good intentions gave way to an epidemic\u2026 one that’s just been declared a public […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/577273"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=577273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/577273\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=577273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=577273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=577273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}