Anyone care to ask Beth Macy how she plans to undo the damage her novel Dopesick did to pain patients? For years, Americans were sold a very specific narrative about prescription opioids, reinforced by Beth Macy’s Dopesick. What deserves a thorough investigation is how some of the very people who helped shape and promote that narrative went on to benefit professionally and financially from opioid litigation, addiction treatment, and government policy. Andrew Kolodny, Anna Lembke, Art Van Zee, and Stephen Loyd all had roles in opioid litigation, addiction medicine, or prescribing policy. Macy herself received an award from the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM), an addiction organization with financial relationships involving addiction-treatment pharmaceutical companies, including the manufacturer of the opioid, Suboxone. (Over 1600 lawsuits have been filed against the makers of Suboxone) If we’re going to follow the money behind prescription opioids, we need to follow the money behind the addiction-treatment industry. What’s particularly troubling is that Macy has acknowledged the harm being done to stable chronic-pain patients through forced tapers and restrictive prescribing policies. Beth, where is the comparable book, documentary, or national investigation into the patients who lost their physicians, their medications, their ability to function, and, in some cases, their lives? The Doctor Patient Forum has spent ten years documenting these stories. It’s time to investigate who profited from restricting them. (Andrew Kolodny (below) earned $500,000 for his expert testimony in a single opioid trial, and that was just ONE of multiple cases in which he served as an expert witness)