FDA cautions drug makers about potential abuse

The Los Angeles Times reports that the Food and Drug Administration "this week released a draft of voluntary guidelines to assist drug makers in figuring out which compounds should be placed under the Controlled Substances Act. The law regulates the handling, record-keeping and dispensing of drugs deemed to be dangerous or addictive if misused -- in some cases imposing criminal penalties for misuse. The guidelines urge researchers to look beyond traditional indicators such as whether a compound is addictive and consider other characteristics that could lead to abuse." One example of a drug that could be more tightly restricted is the anesthetic propofol, part of the "cocktail of drugs that caused the death" of Michael Jackson (Zajac, 1/28).

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This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.