A Documentary Exploring the Pain Medicine Epidemic in America
Join us in building a documentary which exposes the number one cause of accidental deaths in the United States, a nationwide epidemic which affects almost every family in America, annually kills more than four times the people we have lost in ten years of our most recent wars, and is slowly spreading to every community in our country. Our documentary, PainKillers, will uncover the truth and facts behind this epidemic, directly address the reckless opioid pain pill prescribing that is out of control and rising by alarming rates, and also provide hope for those who have had their lives destroyed by this silent killer. Our team will also explore the circular "dance" between Big Pharma, prescribing practitioners and pain patients; and how the dance is designed to create economic consumption and increased addiction.
By contributing to the production of PainKillers, you can help us build this film which will cover unsafe prescribing practices, will expose the perpetrators of this crisis, discover the villains and the hero's in this nationwide saga, and educate viewers about an industry that has acted without discretion or accountability for years.
We will also show there is hope for the future and recovery is possible as we follow the stories of many former pill addicts and their families who have successfully turned their lives around and recovered from their addiction.
Your funding dollars will go towards building all aspects of this firm including conducting interviews, research, production, travel, and all of the other necessary components in creating a successful Documentary. Help us take the first step in putting an end to this silent killer.
Introduction: More than 60,000 Dead, Killers at Large!
The gross manipulation of the medical system here in the United States is unprecedented. PainKillers examines this growing epidemic of abuse and death, and will investigate the history of over-prescribing narcotic pain medications in America. PainKillers examines when corporate and pharmaceutical manipulation of the U.S. Healthcare System and opioid trade began, and how they tie into the current questionable policies and practices of the FDA, medical personnel, and lawmakers.
PainKillers will introduce Big Pharma and its role in this epidemic by exploring the private movement of doctors who are intensively trained and highly paid to act as "sales agents". This includes Big Pharma's representatives and the "sales agents" endorsing "safe" narcotic pills while convincing doctors to prescribe in bulk without concern for the inevitable drug abuse or overdose deaths. Our team will explore the market share of specific narcotic drugs, and the manufacturing costs compared to consumer costs and company profits. PainKillers will likewise explore the "fake grass roots" movements which have been set up and paid for by Big Pharma and provide evidence of their intent to mislead consumers on the facts regarding pain medications.
Our team will look at the FDA's failure to protect consumers by examining its "better than a placebo" low bar process of approving drugs introduced for public consumption. This includes the examination of extremely short-term clinical trials involving small numbers of test subjects who are never properly vetted to identify drug abusers and drug diverters.
PainKillers will show the nexus between prescription opioids and heroin, and will expose the dark secrets of how the pain medication "gateway drugs" affect our children and teens. It will also show how these "gateway drugs" affect the DEA's ability to enforce laws. Additionally, Our team will cover the unspoken, yet powerful synergy that exists between opioid producing pharmaceutical companies and the drug cartels.
PainKillers will include interviews with medical personnel frustrated at the ever-increasing drug abuse, addiction and death rate. Physicians from other countries will also discuss how America is different from the rest of the developed world regarding approval and control of medications; dubious laws and rules that are oftentimes abused or diverted, but all connected to the benefit of Big Pharma and their supporters. These interviews show how virtually all other civilized countries have checks and balances in place to prevent the epidemic of pain pill addiction, accidental overdose death, and heroin addiction encountered by America's youth, and how the United States has utterly failed to enact any reasonable measure of requirements and control relative to testing, producing and prescribing pain killer drugs.
Former and current patients along with addicts and families who have dealt with pain pill addiction will share the affects this tragic problem has on their lives. Some of the families will candidly disclose the loss of their loved one to opioid use, and former users share their return to life without drugs and the struggles involved in their recovery.
Our team will investigate the intentional lack of research and studies here in the United States that would show the devastating effects chronic high dosage opioid pain pill prescriptions have on individuals including loss in thinking, memory, and health over time.
PainKillers will cover U.S. Government reports issued up to 20 years ago warning of this exact problem, including the abuse of Medicaid and Medicare for the purpose of commercial drug diversion. Our team will investigate how our government has done virtually nothing about this problem and will explain how the taxpayers are footing the bill and directly subsidizing the infamous heroin cartels!
The PainKillers Documentary will share the facts tied to this growing and out of control epidemic. It will also provide potential solutions that the consumer, medical personnel, and legislators can embrace to enact change and reform to not only address this uncontrolled problem, but also take steps to cure it.
But there is hope for the future as recovery from pill addiction is possible! We will follow the stories of many former pill addicts and their families as they have ventured into recovery from pain pill addiction and successfully learn how they turned their lives around.
Understanding the Problem
These statistics covered herein come from the CDC.Gov website.
Drug overdose death rates in the US have more than tripled since 1990, and at least 100 people die from prescription drug overdoses every day in the United States, making prescription painkiller overdoses a public health epidemic. Below are some alarming statistics taken from the CDC website:
- Prescription painkiller overdoses killed nearly 15,000 people in the US in 2008. This is more than 3 times the 4,000 people killed by these drugs in 1999.
- In 2010, about 12 million Americans (age 12 or older) reported non-medical use of prescription painkillers in the past year.
- Nearly half a million emergency department visits in 2009 were due to people misusing or abusing prescription painkillers.
- Non-medical use of prescription painkillers costs health insurers up to $72.5 billion annually in direct health care costs.
Certain groups are more likely to abuse or overdose on prescription painkillers:
- Many more men than women die of overdoses from prescription painkillers.
- Middle-aged adults have the highest prescription painkiller overdose rates.
- People in rural counties are nearly twice as likely to overdose on prescription painkillers as people in big cities.
- Whites and American Indian or Alaska Natives are more likely to overdose on prescription painkillers
- About 1 in 10 American Indian or Alaska Natives aged 12 or older used prescription painkillers for non-medical reasons in the past year, compared to 1 in 20 whites and 1 in 30 blacks.
The supply of prescription painkillers is larger than ever:
- The quantity of prescription painkillers sold to pharmacies, hospitals, and doctors’ offices was 4 times larger in 2010 than in 1999.
- Many states report problems with "pill mills" where doctors prescribe large quantities of painkillers to people who don’t need them medically. Some people also obtain prescriptions from multiple prescribers by "doctor shopping."
Some states have a bigger problem with prescription painkillers than others:
- Prescription painkiller sales per person were more than 3 times higher in Florida, which has the highest rate, than in Illinois, which has the lowest.
- In 2008/2009, non-medical use of painkillers in the past year ranged from 1 in 12 people (age 12 or older) in Oklahoma to 1 in 30 in Nebraska.
- States with higher sales per person and more non-medical use of prescription painkillers tend to have more deaths from drug overdoses.
The unprecedented rise in overdose deaths in the US parallels a 300% increase since 1999 in the sale of these strong painkillers. These drugs were involved in 14,800 overdose deaths in 2008, more than cocaine and heroin combined. The misuse and abuse of prescription painkillers was responsible for more than 475,000 emergency department visits in 2009, a number that nearly doubled in just five years. More than 12 million people reported using prescription painkillers non-medically in 2010, that is, using them without a prescription or solely for the feeling they cause.
In 2010, 2 million people reported using prescription painkillers non-medically for the first time within the last year — nearly 5,500 a day!
Just for comparison, the United States has lost approximately 7,000 soldiers in both Iraq Wars and the Afghanistan war. Every year we lose four times as many lives to Rx drug overdose than we have lost in 10 years of our most recent wars!
There are two very important things to keep in mind. First, the prescription drug deaths are significantly under-reported as many hard hit rural area coroners do not have the money to pay for testing the newer synthetic drugs in the victim's blood; drugs such as Fentanyl and oxymorphone. Second, many of the heroin overdoses were experienced by young people who started their drug addictions by purchasing illegally diverted pain pills and only switched to the cheaper stronger heroin because they could no longer afford the pain pills. This adds a very difficult dynamic to tracking accurate statistics relative to overdose deaths originated from pain pills because they are a "gateway" drug.
As you can see, this is a massive epidemic that is out of control and only growing in size. What will the statistics look like for 2012? 2015? The facts regarding this unnecessary killer serves as the core driving force for our Documentary.
The Team
David G. Greenberg, M.D., MPH, Producer
With more than 30 years of experience, Dr. Greenberg has dedicated much of his career to public health issues, and holds degrees from the University of California at Berkeley, the University of California Medical School at Davis, and a Masters in Public Health from the University of Arizona in Tucson. Dr. Greenberg is an Addiction Medicine specialist, and is certified by the American Board of Addiction Medicine. He is also a long time member of the American Academy of Pain Medicine, and the National Association of Drug Diversion Investigators. Dr. Greenberg works as a consultant and expert witness for the US Attorney’s Office, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and has also consulted for the FBI on drug diversion and drug abuse cases. He currently maintains a small private practice caring for patients with addiction issues, and also serves medically indigent patients who suffer from pain pill and other related addictions.
Charlie Beauchamp, Filmmaker
Documentary Filmmaker and Producer Charlie Beauchamp was born and raised in Saint Petersburg, Florida. Charlie started working as a pharmaceutical technician in 2006. By 2007, he noticed an increasing number of prescriptions for the painkiller oxycodone. Charlie's interest in this subject was piqued by this trend, and in 2011 he would go on to produce and direct the award-winning "Florida Blues", a short documentary about the use of oxycodone. Charlie has also produced the short films Hope and Infinite Nightmare.
Mark Kitchell, Filmmaker & Consultant
An award winning documentary film maker from San Francisco who is a graduate of the NYU Film School, Mr. Kitchell received an Academy Award Nomination for his film “Berkeley in the Sixties” and his most recent documentary, “A Fierce Green Fire”, selected by the Sundance Film Festival in 2012 .We are most honored that a filmmaker of Mark’s stature has agreed to be a senior documentary consultant for our project.
Funding & Spending
The core cost of our Documentary is projected to be $17,500. This includes flights, hotels, car rentals, equipment, interview, crew and editing costs. Additional funding will be used to secure interviews, support additional travel, and cover costs related to obtaining additional documentation and factual content supporting the core theme of the documentary.
If we are able to raise $15,000 above our $17,500 base (for a total of $32,500), we will also create a customized version of the documentary to educate opioid drug prescribing practitioners. This enhanced documentary will focus on dealing with the "sales force" of big pharma and train practitioners how to differentiate the truth vs. the lies told about their products, present factual details showing the harm current policies have caused to practitioners, provide additional statistical data regarding overdose deaths, near deaths, and side effects, and provide examples of what practitioners can do to improve the safety of their controlled substance prescribing. Two additional doctors will join Dr. Greenberg to create this new content and the main line of distribution will be through health care insurance companies.
If we are able to raise $40,000 total, we will also set up a web based virtual memorial site so that families, friends, and co-workers may post memorial photos, tributes, and prayers for their loved ones who have died as a result of this tragically avoidable epidemic of prescription opioid pill diversion, abuse, and resultant transitions to heroin abuse. May their deaths be not be in vain, or simply written off as acceptable collateral damage by the narcotics manufacturers.
We have already been approached by a major health care insurer and a large U.S. Medical Board to develop this extended documentary on safer narcotic drug prescribing practices so already companies and organizations are asking for this potentially life-saving professional educational offering!
Schedule
Our below schedule is based on completing the Main Documentary covered under Funding and Spending.
Filming & Production (May 1st to June 15th, 2013)
The Filming & Production schedule includes conducting all interviews, creating the recordings, and refining the materials, ensuring all of the core film is captured for the complete documentary.
Post Production (June 16th to July 20th, 2013)
We anticipate having a Rough Cut of the documentary around May 10th, 2013, and the second Rough Cut by May 20th, 2013.
Final Cut (July 30th, 2013)
We anticipate the final cut of this documentary being complete by May 30th, 2013.
Distribution & Visibility
The majority of independent documentaries are given visibility through the numerous independent film festivals. We will be submitting to film festivals through mediums such as www.withoutabox.com. Below is a list of a few festivals we will submit to.
- Docutah – St. George, Utah 2013
- SilverDocs – Silver Spring, Maryland 2013
- San Diego Film Festival – San Diego, California 2013
- True/False – Columbia, Missouri 2014
- Full Frame – Durham, North Carolina 2014
- Sunscreen Film Festival – St. Petersburg, Florida 2014
We will also directly approach Netflix, Amazon, iTunes and Google Play about streaming our documentary as well.
Risks
As with any project, there are potential challenges which may arise during filing, production and distribution. Below is an over of some of these risks:
Interview Scheduling Conflicts
Our team is flying around the country to meet with people to conduct interviews. Real life happens. It is possible some of the people being interviewed may back out at the last moment, or need to reschedule. Some people being interviewed may even have second thoughts going on camera to tell their story even with the assurance that they won’t be recognized.
This is why we are setting up more interviews than we need; to ensure we get the necessary footage even if some of the people who are currently schedule do back out for whatever reasons.
Going over budget
As with any project, while our budget is well defined, it's always possible for costs to increase beyond our projections due to unforeseen circumstances.
Mr. Beauchamp has prior experience in completing documentaries, so he is aware of the potential issues which may come up. If our project does go over budget, Dr. Greenberg and other supporters will personally address the deficiency, ensuring completion of this documentary.
Postproduction Delays
Once all of the footage has been filmed, editing and finalizing any Documentary takes time. While we can estimate the post production and editing process based on our experience creating Documentaries in the past, the overall drive of doing something "better" each time can result in additional challenges of refining the materials to reflect a powerful and refined complete Documentary. While we anticipate the final cut being complete mid-march, it may take longer to properly edit the film to the standards necessary to meet our goals. If we encounter a shift in our timeline, we will be sure to share this information with our supporters.
Distribution Issues
Whenever one relies on distribution through a means outside of their control, there is always the risk of encountering issues. While we have never heard of streaming systems through Amazon turning a documentary down for publication, getting into film festivals requires a screening and approval process by a group of reviewers. Our documentary must adhere to certain standards to ensure approval, but it's never guaranteed.
Making a Difference
Join us in making a change in the world. Help us educate people, expand the level of awareness of the pain pill epidemic that is sweeping throughout the United States, and most importantly; help us give hope to addicts, showing them and their families that complete recovery is possible.
Follow us on our Twitter account to keep track of the documentary progress and completion. Tell your friend and family about this project. If you have a question, please don't hesitate to contact us.