i think that's what dr. wen, myself, dr. drew pinski is here, we learned that there was no perceived harm. insurance companies loved it, it was cheaper to get a pill than do physical therapy and other things. pharmaceutical companies liked it, they're selling more pills, and they bought into this. much of the blame is on our shoulders. >> talking about limits. meet somebody else for whom at one point there were no limits. ray lucas is a former quarterback taking up to 1400 opioid pills a month. is that right? >> that's correct. started from a football injury, didn't have insurance. 300 turns into 600. before i knew it, 1400 pills a month, doing tv, doing the jets stuff. i was a functioning addict. >> you could function. >> day before i went on tv, i would stop taking the pills. do the show. as soon as the producer said five, four, the pain would rush back. i would go downstairs, take 15 pills right away. before i got in the truck to go home. i only live in jersey, coming from new york, i would take 15 more. at my worst, i ha

from what i'm hearing from dr. wen and others is if we hit the treatment level window becoming addicted to painkillers, if you hit it and it doesn't get to the other level of the opium. so i think if we could find it that would be important. the senate recently acted on this crisis. they passed the comprehensive addiction and recovery act of 2016 to help prevent and treat the opioid addiction. but it does not provide any funding. so what good is a program that doesn't provide any funding? does this program help people suffering in your city or your area? >> obviously congresswoman, funding is a necessary component of any program that we offer. if i could add just one thing because we talked a lot about treatment, and we've mention that that is on the tail end. that's reactive. this country came together. it galvanized around tobacco use and get profoundly changed the way our youth look at that. if this country would come together, if the congress come if the state and local level, it would come together around the camp

i went to ask you, dr. wen, especially, we have talked about opioids being used as the entry-level drug for pain control. one of the problems that i see here and, mr. botticelli, you and i have worked together before and you know i have sponsored legislation in georgia state senate for the georgia-- one of the problems i see is with the fda taking a lot of the products off the market. now, specifically want to talk about propoxyphene. it was on the market for years and years and i can imagine how much i dispensing my career and i will tell you when they took it off, what did you ask it led people to opioids because that's the only choice doctors had. your ibuprofen and see to medicine that's really to start. is a practicing pharmacist i can tell you you try to get a patient to take something available without a prescription and you won't be able to convince them it will work. you have to have a prescription for it. that's just the latest. no, it's not right, but i will try as hard as i can and i cannot convince

dr. wen, what happened? in other words, this was not a problem, not as much of a problem. then something happened. can you tell me what happened? the numbers the gentleman cited, and i realize people are moving from the opioids to heroin. what happened with regard to opioids to get so many people on them that they moved to heroin. my understanding is there was aggressive marketing by drug ispanies so the pain scale something that is up during the course of a hospital stay. the goal should be appropriate treatment. but an expectation is placed on patients and doctors. doctors are put in a hard place of satisfying those requirements. >> doctors have a tough time. in other words, the patient keeps coming in, and the pain -- be a 2, being the mildest the patient has a 2. then he or she comes in and does not tell the truth and says i am at a 9. is that the kind of thing that happens? >> that definitely happens. doctors feel they have to get zero,tients pain to which includes overprescribing painkillers in order to do so. >> would you like to say something? >> i agree we set up

dr. wen pointed out that the money that she receives from the public health emergency preparedness funding has been cut -- cut -- in order to pay for the zika funds. well, it's these emergency preparedness funds that are used bid our local health departments -- by our local health departments to reach out and deal with the vulnerable populations, to make sure they understand the risk factors and do what they can to prevent the risk factors. i also was talking to our representative from maryland from the department of agriculture which does mosquito control. several people talked to me about mosquito control. one of the things you want to do is have a comprehensive plan to eradicate mosquitoes during the season. and it's very effective. the problem is that these budgets are capped. they don't have the resources to do what they need to do. they were telling me that we were better-prepared a couple years ago than we are today in dealing with mosquito control. so we need to coordinate that effort