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tv   Documentary  RT  April 5, 2021 4:30pm-5:00pm EDT

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i am going. to.
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wow not walk to the street. to campaign. not walk the streets. i can see. mr chops. 60 streets like. oklahoma in the heart of america one of the most deeply afflicted states in the opioids addiction crisis oklahoma might change the course of history.
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for the 1st time in the united states a doctor will be sued by the state for 2nd degree murder for over prescribing opioids here's the accused that to reconnect calls. a family doctor for over 22 years she is now suspected of being a prescription murderer. the judge has to ascertain if there is enough material to go to trial. the plaintiffs in the room have lost a child a brother a friend from an opioid overdose. dr nichols was their doctor she was the one prescribing the drugs.
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urban box i'm an attorney in oklahoma city i practice cripple defense i've got a police officer and i've been a prosecutor and i've been a judge i've been here all my life born and raised in oklahoma. the right the hard to the oil production we're right on the edge of we're cowboys are that and so we've got a lot of people in here that are hard working people and it's a pretty peaceful city as far as that goes. box knows these roads inside out and is on 1st name terms with the local people all his career he's defended this community but today the clients have changed before i was having people from where the poverty level people all walks of life i have lawyers i have doctors children that become addicted to the opiates now it's every level in every area of life is for is for the low income high and. all of what affected by the opiate use.
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he represents several families from this town everyone has lost a relative deceased if a cardiac arrest following a painkiller overdose drugs prescribed by dr nicholas. tough enough it really is this and. this oklahoma city lawyer has never seen a case like this and you victim wants to press charges. come in you can see i'm going to see you. have a seat and that marshall has been raising her 2 children alone since her husband died of a painkiller overdose my math shows that's 99 per day that she would prescribe him and he passed away about my 2nd. one in 20122012. he was a fireman she works in education counselor a regular family all. it was back surgery to turn everything over in
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a few months her husband became addicted to the painkillers prescribed by dr nichols of course once you have that surgery it's never quite the same and then they get some other treatment anyhow and you know it's a matter issues with just on the judge just injuries it from being to having such a physical job and i think it just snowballed you know he persisted with the pain but instead of trying to wean him off though she did those after dose after dose after dose and really became his drug dealer. more drugs than the regular drug dealers of the street would prescribe but she's doing it in the name of medicine. according to her doctor nicholas would swiftly see patients without any physical exam a few dollars for a prescription her husband would have been prescribed $100.00 pills a day $3000.00 a month the doctor should have been the response well person they're trained in that's what their job is is to make sure they're treating you in
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a healthy manner and they're doing what's best for you and not what's going to bring harm to you. it happens to just your next door neighbor to your uncle miltie firefighters here comma city police officer to your school teacher to your you know it's a it's not a it's not a disease that is specific it can hit anybody. how come opioids invaded america pain has become a market and the idea of not suffering even likely as we get in drug stores that look like fast food anyone can shop for pain killers physical or psychological a pain killer exists for almost any reason. imagine facing the day with less chronic osteoarthritis pain. imagine living your life with less chronic low back pain. imagine with less pain and amongst the pain killers on prescriptions are the
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opioids usually prescribed for back aches or headaches 2000000 americans are addicted to these pills for a reason that most ignore their opium based. i'm jason be minute and i am the chair of psychiatry at oklahoma state university's center for health sciences our oath is essentially 1st do no harm and i think that that's one of the biggest problems is that doctors don't realize that by prescribe opioids. that they could doing more harm than good and we've seen that in a lot of a lot of cases what were they originally prescribed for well historically the uses been for what we call cancer pain cancer does a lot of horrible things streamer body and can cause a lot of pain nowadays it's used for a lot of different things these pills hydrocodone. content
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are found to no other drugs that are legally sold on the market share the same component a powerful narcotic heroin and sometimes they are a 1000 times more concentrated. the opioid compound comes from a plant called the opium poppy and these plants are really grown mostly in asia and then they're imported by drug companies into the united states but what we do with the pills is we take the good parts of the flour that you would smoke and we concentrate them in a little pill. and so the pills are a much more potent than smoking ever was but in the united states we outlawed the smoking of opium in the early 1900 if you get a 3 day per script there's a 13 percent chance that you'll be taking those opioids
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a year later so whether it's a few prescriptions or a few pills it's a very small amount that it takes to get addicted. to the left a lethal dosage of heroin to the right it's equivalent to opium samples. to date you know something for your pain talk to your doctor. to be able to not feel pain has become a tacit agreement between doctor and patient this is what price. these drugs a ticking bombs who's aware of that fact did dr nichols know. a wrongful death lawsuit was filed today against a midwest city dr breggin nichols is already accused are prescribing a massive amount of opioids to 5 patients who later died when i heard that there
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was 4 other deaths that. good evening a midwest city doc you got 3 i'm homeless tonight 3000000 jobs davis i'm just reading and listening to the jury just raising this many times you just got i mean . i was very happy she got a rest in our question on t.v. oh very happy that there were no 4 it was sad because this is from 3 daughters i mean did she harm i didn't know any internet i met a man why america should search for a man and manage to. a met. her. you. mean these are innate he has spent her entire life in this here also that she passed away as a painkiller overdose in 2013 their story is one of an analgesic burdened family hiding in the secret and shame with addiction. she's headed for
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a back surgeries dr nichols was nice this doctor for 7 years she was the 1st to fall into the opioids trap when i 1st started seeing her i thought she was going to be ok and she was giving me pain medicine to help my back but as the years go by course your body gets used to that medicine so that it doesn't work you know you used to could take one page bill and now you have to stay 2 or 3 pain pills because the pain is so bad. so it just increase and it's just a vicious cycle because you know you've got to have the medicine but you know you don't want to have to take that much medicine but you can't i could work and do my job if i didn't have as. much as lisa had her own addiction what she didn't know is that her daughter was doing the same thing for 3 years chelsea had diabetes which causes muscular pains it was her time to consult
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with dr nichols. and i asked her about the quantity of medicine she was under and her response to me was chelsea was an adult that she could talk to me about chelsea's medical but she could talk to me about chelsea's diabetes but she wouldn't talk to me about. the medication that she was there i did trust her maybe money for you or. maybe just that the love of money maybe gets worse because i know that when she chose to be a doctor i would bet on it and she chose to want to help people.
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is your media a reflection of reality. in a world transformed. what will make you feel safe. isolation full community. are you going the right way or are you being
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led to. direct. what is true what is faith. in a world corrupted you need to descend. to join us in the depths. or a made in the shallowness. we're segregated along by social class. people also world poverty by 1st. if you're born into a poor family if you're born into a minority family if you're born into a family that only has a single parent that really constrains your life chances people die on average 15 years younger that is your point it's a generational poverty. it's a tough fight every day. meets your needs and the needs of your family.
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doctor nichols almost a year ago i think she has a very good heart she wants to help people maybe a little awkward but she's got a really sweet heart my name's tommy. i mean a criminal defense attorney here in oklahoma city we represent dr ragan nichols or really like her very much. doctors lose patients all the time. to accuse a doctor of. acting in reckless disregard for her patients when we believe that she was genuinely attempting to care for them. is a big step for the government that's a. that exposes doctors to a lot of risk troubled people these patients were abusing the things that they had access to. it wasn't the amounts that dr nichols prescribed these people that
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killed them it was the announce that they decided to take. her line of defense is set to shift away the shadow of responsibilities dr nichols was an irreproachable professional who was duped by drug addicts and she never had any awareness that her patients were facing any danger whatsoever. now adays in oklahoma city addiction can be seen at every corner. i think america got here because we are the most medicated country in the world. we are a country of fast food quick fixes now now and now feel bad here's
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a pill her here's a pill tell disfunction here's a pill all of those things are right there at a doctor's pen his good painter minds us that we're alive. he went to the center as a patient since then he's become the head of the facility in order to save others like himself everyone here has to learn to live without pain killers this private ranches 30 places a year it receives 40 requests a day at 21 years old kyle is in rehab for the 1st time to. sub rather. i'm good will cool man i feel and. i gotcha. us stay clean if. you're ready all right ram. or get your mom in here and we'll good will get everything started. right after you guys.
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are really. has been to college and he's the father of a little boy. but 4 years ago he became addicted to opioids and then heroin. writes opiates heroin and oxycontin anything else now. and this is the 1st treatment on right all right are you feel very emotional. the motion of everybody she's waiting for her boy to come back. is going to take about 30 days for you to really begin to see a change. so as life and death man there's only 3 ways out of this which is get sober which is what i pray for you on the 2nd one is is prison if you're lucky 3rd one is. the barry. i
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don't know how else to say it but on them mike and i can't do the similar as. our own so much rather not see how. then who are more at this moment i don't know i. really would be on the one who. brought you here. kyle has 90 days to learn to live without opioids. how it feels to learn like my body is a a lot of. my thought process it's slow. for just about all of it and they're in the. south i'm oceans of me it's
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just i can't keep my emotions in one place and you know on top of. her i just are of the little bit. one of our friends who died for all of us ferns and. after that. we in my friends kind of stuck together and were doing these pills and it was just blocking out so much pain or so stressed out i. fighting back tears every day i think that's hard to hide thinking it was just blocking out that pain. that made me feel good it made me forget it. actually helped me out with a lot of things depend on it. i was. that was my girl you know that was
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well loved and then. just this last year like too many too many bad things of last for family and that wasn't enough that wasn't enough to write or change. mentally in my head but now it's gotten close to suicide. these pills are. a. little. just like tobacco addiction the dangers of opioids have been had and it has taken 20 years for the government to take action for financial reasons.
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in my office filed a lawsuit against purdue pharma. so long and janssen pharmaceuticals. in putting this lawsuit together. we believe these companies are culpable for the tragic heartbreaking number of oklahomans who have become addicted or who have died as a result of the opioid epidemic in our state. he's the oklahoma attorney general and the 1st one in his country to go to battle. my counter is publicly accusing pharmaceutical companies of having caused this epidemic. he wanted to prove that he and his team have been investigating for more than a year. on the turn here in oklahoma city
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. in my mind this model burrage i am my lawyer in oklahoma. sir. carol hunter hired my law firm whitman burrage to represent the state of oklahoma and try to recoup all of the costs that the state has incurred because of the opioid epidemic we need this person. and. i think we're going to be able to prove that 80 percent of all the crime in the state of oklahoma is directly caused by this opioid epidemic in our prisons are over feel because of the loss of productivity of taxpaying citizens costs the state money but i'm anxious to get this 1st this 1st battle started
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what they did to this country. it's pretty amazing. their estimates bring the cost of the epidemic to $7000000000.00 in oklahoma. city this is storm cool hearing will take place in a few days. today reggie which will explain his motivations to a group of students that this struggle is a personal one. partner a gene has been involved in the opioid addiction in the opioid crosses ever since the death his son brian and i had a nice that also related to drugs and so when the attorney general talked to us about representing the state. in this case. i think he knew that we both had family members that because of the epidemic.
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we're going to talk to incoming freshmen athletes at the university of oklahoma i'm going to tell a. story about my son brandon. that the power of addiction and how dangerous it is. and maybe. save somebody's life. i think i got a chance to shake almost everybody's hand when you came in i was trying to figure out what sport you are it's hard to guess every sport from your you know your size but thank you guys for coming so let me introduce you to my co speakers and this is brandon. and ran is not here today and i'll tell you why later this is me when i
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was at o. u. and i had this young son and also when i had more hair. i was a cute little kid brand his plan was to go to college and play football which he did. he ended up playing on the national championship football team never got in any kind of trouble in the drug that brought him down as an opioid and it did not come from the streets it came from a pharmacy i just told him stop using those pills and i found that it's not that easy i found out it's like telling a diabetic to use more willpower and stop needing insulin you can't do that that's crazy i never told him about addiction i never warned him. and so now i i have survivor guilt now but i'm living with it so i started
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a foundation called fighting addiction through education because i think education is the key to this problem and when i tell this story a school's it gets so quiet you could hear a pin drop and they're not really interested in me they're interested in brandon they i show pictures of him he was one of them he's just ordinary kid and if an ordinary kid like brandon can end up getting hooked. they could and that is the truth these pills that big pharma sells they're essentially heroin pills most people don't know that but these opioids are essentially the same this heroin that's the key telling patients that they're not addictive that's the killer literally thank you guys for being a good audience and i'm hoping some of the information i've shared with you today. might help you get a good. son
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never managed to quit. is someone responsible for his misery. pharmaceutical. the swarms of them so. good who was before. much of those who heard it's a preview or. soon will. move . move.
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move show you the stupid you have who believe you look there are. more than just love most is those who give you a good. go go to shuls a look but to assume you. explore to go. just don't. get to meet until it was the littlest they'd see you look at israel. contentious not just institutionally it's a mash told. mr president please introduce more students. as we have petitions to go to school to snoop on what i knew of those the girls who are serious who could use to whom she shouldn't be you should put dorothy what was your desire.
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was. fresh protests in europe over covert restrictions there's mixed messages from governments leave people confused and angry we can't go where we want we can't come together we can't see our loved ones anymore how we think this is absolutely against our fundamental human rights the u.s. state of vermont defends prioritising nonwhite residents for the covert job a move that some of condemned as racist. and a surge in anti asian hate crimes in the u.s. a martial arts center in california the state by far the worst affected open self-defense classes for the most vulnerable. of a scandal hits u.k. supporters questions are raised over a probe into 2 british olympians and how they were tested.

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