Will The FDA's New Prescription Painkiller Warnings Make A Difference?

Addiction to pain pills has become an epidemic, especially for women.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced at the end of March that it will require common opioid painkillers like oxycodone and morphine to carry a “black box” warning. These are the strongest warnings the FDA can issue, and this one will caution users about the potential for addiction, abuse, and overdose.

What’s behind the move? Opioid addiction has been on the rise for decades in the U.S. and has reached epidemic-like proportions. It’s also a big problem for women. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), every three minutes, a woman goes to the ER after abusing prescription painkillers—and in 2010 (the latest year for which stats are available), five times as many women died from overdosing than in 1999.

The hope with the new warning, the FDA says, is that it will raise awareness of the potential risks involved with taking opioids. “Today’s actions are one of the largest undertakings for informing prescribers of risks across opioid products, and one of many steps the FDA intends to take this year as part of our comprehensive action plan to reverse this epidemic," said FDA commissioner Robert Califf, M.D., in a press release.

Yet, while a severe warning sounds good in theory, is it really going to do all that much? Steve Yoon, M.D., a physiatrist at Kerlan-Jobe Orthopaedic Clinic in Los Angeles, who is trained in pain medicine, is hopeful. “This black box warning may make a practitioner think twice before prescribing this medication,” he says.

Will The FDA's New Prescription Painkiller Warnings Make A Difference?

Addiction to pain pills has become an epidemic, especially for women.

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