The Pain Sale: An Analysis of the Socio-cultural, Political, and Industrial Frameworks that Contributed to The Opioid Crisis, as Epitomized by Purdue Pharma
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- In the fall of 2017, President Donald Trump declared the opioid crisis a national public health emergency. Mounting overdose rates and their financial burdens on medical resources pressured Trump to verbally address the crisis, but it has yet to be substantiated by significant action. Without funding for necessary entities like treatment programs, prescription opioid abuse continues to affect the nation. Common literature surrounding the crisis implicates Purdue Pharma, one of the leading prescription opioid producers, and the inventor of OxyContin, as the primary force behind the opioid crisis. Analysis of existing industrial frameworks, however, sheds light on the ways in which Purdue Pharma epitomizes the pharmaceutical industry (Big Pharma) and the legacy of the tobacco industry (Big Tobacco) primarily through deceptive marketing and exculpation strategies. This is not to say that Purdue Pharma is blameless, but instead relates their role in the opioid crisis to other factors, including social perceptions of pain and its management, understandings of addiction, and the manipulation of the consumer and public. With a focus on content analysis, this examination primarily draws from investigative journals and reports, which are complemented by scientific studies and academic knowledge. I hope to establish a more profound understanding of what allowed for the crisis to occur and gain traction by delineating the industrial infrastructure that characterizes Purdue Pharma as a product and consequence of the aforementioned aspects. This focus on Purdue Pharma is intended to provide a concrete example of industrial greed and the reuse of deceptive rhetorical strategies for commercial gain, similar to those implemented by Big Tobacco. The resulting synthesis identifies patterns of similarities between Big Tobacco and Big Pharma which are epitomized by the misleading marketing of Purdue Pharma’s product, OxyContin.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Date created | May 2018 |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Natalie Marie Chun |
|---|---|
| Primary advisor | Proctor, Robert |
| Advisor | Sato, Kyoko |
| Degree granting institution | Stanford University, The Program in Science, Technology, and Society |
Subjects
| Subject | Opioid Crisis |
|---|---|
| Subject | Pain Management |
| Subject | OxyContin |
| Subject | Purdue Pharma |
| Subject | Addiction |
| Subject | Overdose |
| Subject | Abuse |
| Subject | Big Pharma |
| Subject | Big Tobacco |
| Subject | Deception |
| Genre | Thesis |
Bibliographic information
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- Use and reproduction
- User agrees that, where applicable, content will not be used to identify or to otherwise infringe the privacy or confidentiality rights of individuals. Content distributed via the Stanford Digital Repository may be subject to additional license and use restrictions applied by the depositor.
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license (CC BY).
Preferred citation
- Preferred Citation
- Chun, Natalie. (2018). The Pain Sale: An Analysis of the Socio-cultural, Political, and Industrial Frameworks that Contributed to The Opioid Crisis, as Epitomized by Purdue Pharma. Unpublished Honors Thesis. Stanford University, Stanford CA.
Collection
Stanford University, Program in Science, Technology and Society, Honors Theses
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- Contact
- natalie5@stanford.edu
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