“Less than 1 percent of people who use prescription opioids long-term will become addicted” – that changed the mindset of physicians across the country.

— Perri Peltz.

Marketing has always played an important role for Purdue Pharma. With the pharmaceutical industry being highly regulated by the government, marketing acts as a way for companies to expand their clientele to increase their profits. Increased profits are crucial for pharmaceutical innovation, allowing for companies to invest in research and development for their products. While companies often use marketing as a vehicle to educate and promote their products amongst consumers, monetary incentives can often be prioritized over the safety of public health. This type of thinking drives Purdue Pharma to aggressively market their product OxyContin, a decision that ultimately contributed to the devastating health epidemic known as the opioid crisis.

Prior to the mid 1990’s, opioids were only used in extreme cases – post surgery, hospice care, and pain related to cancer. Purdue Pharma has dominated this sector of the health care industry with their popular drug MS Contin, an extended-release morphine tablet. After getting approval for their drug by the Food and Drug Administration(FDA) Purdue began aggressively marketing OxyContin as an all purpose pain reliever. Purdue misrepresented the risk of addiction publicizing that only 1% of patients taking OxyContin became addicted. They pushed this narrative despite conflicting evidence that proved the risk for addiction when taking OxyContin. After which, Purdue began incentivizing doctors to prescribe large doses of OxyContin to profit off patients suffering from chronic pain. The commercial success of OxyContin is correlated with the wide spread abuse of opioids throughout the country.