Very important ProPublica articles on corporate ties to health care practices. See excerpt and another link below:
The head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has declared the overdoses from opioid drugs like OxyContin an "epidemic." [3] And a growing group of experts doubts that they work for long-term pain.
But the pills continue to have an influential champion in the American Pain Foundation, which describes itself as the nation's largest advocacy group for pain patients. Its message: The risk of addiction is overblown, and the drugs are underused.
What the nonprofit doesn't highlight is the money behind that message.
via www.propublica.org
Both of these links are from an indepth investigative series at ProPublica, Dollars for Doctors.
See also: Two Leaders in Pain Treatment Have Long Ties to Drug Industry