Pubdate: Sun, 04 Jun 2006
Source: Charleston Gazette (WV)
Copyright: 2006 Charleston Gazette
Contact:  http://www.wvgazette.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/77
Note: Does not print out of town letters.
Author: Scott Finn and Tara Tuckwiller
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?136 (Methadone)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/oxycontin.htm (Oxycontin/Oxycodone)

Series: The Killer Cure (Introduction)

HOW WE DID IT

The Sunday Gazette-Mail's investigation of nationwide methadone 
deaths was prompted by an obscure entry in a West Virginia vital 
statistics report.

Accidental poisoning deaths in the state had shot up dramatically in 
five years, reporter Scott Finn noticed. He thought it might be 
toddlers ingesting cleaning supplies, or maybe people overdosing on 
OxyContin. He called the medical examiner's office to check. No, he 
was told. The main culprit was a drug called methadone.

Reporter Tara Tuckwiller had been reporting on methadone clinics -- 
treatment centers that sell daily doses of legal methadone to calm 
addicts' cravings for illegal drugs -- since they began to crop up in 
West Virginia in 2001.  - advertisement -

For more than six months, Tuckwiller and Finn investigated why so 
many people are dying after taking methadone. They first examined 
whether the treatment clinics were the source of the methadone 
involved in the deaths.

But they discovered another cause -- methadone being prescribed to 
treat pain -- after interviewing medical examiners, epidemiologists 
and other experts across the nation.

Other states were experiencing similar increases in methadone 
overdoses, they found.

A tip from a state health official led them to the National Center 
for Health Statistics, which collects data from death certificates 
across the country. The Center ran an analysis of this data and 
provided it to the Sunday Gazette-Mail for this report.

Officially, the "cause of death" in each of these cases is poisoning, 
not any specific drug. Medical examiners say methadone contributes to 
the poisoning death. Sometimes, more than one drug is listed as 
contributing to death.

Critics say medical examiners are too quick to blame methadone for 
deaths that could have been caused by other drugs. They also point 
out that the majority of overdose deaths involving methadone also 
include other drugs.