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The opioid crisis 

 •  • by Paul Ingraham
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Weekly nuggets of pain science news and insight, usually 100-300 words, with the occasional longer post. The blog is the “director’s commentary” on the core content of PainScience.com: a library of major articles and books about common painful problems and popular treatments. See the blog archives or updates for the whole site.

The opioid crisis has been in the news a lot this year. Today I’m just doing my bit to spread the word, making sure my readers know about this. My position is a reflection of what most official guidelines now say: although opioids have their uses, no one should take them for chronic musculoskeletal pain, because …

Plainly stated, the risks of opioids are addiction and death, and the benefits for chronic pain are often transient and generally unproven.

CDC Director Tom Frieden, press briefing in March

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