News Notes
Wednesday 24 January 2024
Chronic Pain in the Courts
Recovery from knee replacement is not linear. I keep feeling like I’m getting well and overdoing it and going through set backs. Arghhhhhhhhhhh. But, I have cat therapists.
Chronic Pain
John Flannery (former prosecutor and frequent guest on MSNBC) argued a case before the D.C. Court of Appeals on behalf of chronic pain patients yesterday.
John Flannery (1/24/24)
Flannery has been doing legal work for patients who have had pain medication taken away because the DEA put their doctors out of business.
• Flannery talked in this podcast about the original 240 patients of a doctor in California whose license was suspended by the DEA.
“Every doctor that gives pain medication is suspect,” argued Flannery.
• The DEA does not accept the principle that people have to have a certain level of freedom from pain in order to function.
• When the DEA prevents a doctor from prescribing pain medication his patients are abandoned.
• The DEA thinks they should be allowed to conduct closed proceedings involving the ability of these patients to get medication.
• One of the patients and his caretaker committed suicide because they had been denied medication before (see story below).
• “We are all going to face pain in our lives.” Said Flannery
• The government is slowing an appeal of the case involving the former patients of the California doctor by claiming that there has been no decision in the case.
• “You cannot make illness a crime.”
• “There’s almost never a change…without a fight.”
• Flannery has written a book about chronic pain: “Pain in America – and How our Government Makes it Worse.” (2007) John Flannery
• Book Blurb: John P. Flannery, II, is a former federal prosecutor from New York City who prosecuted multimillion dollar heroin conspiracies. He believes, however, that our government is dead wrong to prosecute physicians for treating chronic pain patients. I am ashamed that the Justice Department is doing this, Flannery says. There are 75 million Americans who suffer long term excruciating pain and the government is making it worse . For many pain patients, neither surgery nor alternative procedures ease their pain. Congress authorized the use of controlled substances to treat their chronic pain. But the Justice Department, Flannery argues, opposes prescriptions of these controlled substances. It prosecutes the physicians who treat chronic pain patients. Flannery holds the government accountable for destroying the once sacrosanct relationship of physician and patient, for criminalizing chronic pain treatment, and for creating a public health crisis of under-treated patients. Flannery tells the tragic story of patients and physicians who are the victims in this war against pain medicine, explains the history of privacy and how the government is destroying that right, suggests how we may protect ourselves from the government, and issues a chilling warning to be vigilant in the face of this tyranny lest we lose our rights once and for all.
Sources:
Couple Commits Suicide
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/dea-fentanyl-opioid-crisis-suicide-b2236501.html
Law, Power, and Justice 
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