Life Saving –
January 29, 2020 – “Instead of expanding access to treatment and saving lives, government inaction has led to the creation of active street markets for these medications in Philadelphia and elsewhere,” the office wrote in its news release this week. Krasner said his office had determined that “a few hundred people” are arrested each year in Philadelphia for buprenorphine possession without a prescription. His office could not say immediately how many of those charges were prosecuted.
The District Attorney’s Office said research indicates that most people who use buprenorphine bought on the street are using it to stave off withdrawal. Often, drug users and harm-reductionists say, it’s easier to buy buprenorphine on the street than to enter a treatment program to obtain it through a physician’s prescription.
