Approximately 100 people a year die from the over consumption of codeine in its many forms, whether that be as nurofen plus, codral flu tablets, panadeine or even panama. Codeine is a depressant drug in the opioid group used to reduce acute pain, coughing or diarrhoea.
Today I will be addressing the issue of over the counter codeine medication bans and alluding to the bounds of studies and research in the recent years of why the codeine ban is such a great initiative by the Australian government. From February 1st this year the Australian government and department of health issued that over the counter codeine sales will be banned. This means to use these depressant drugs you will have to attend your local general practitioner for a prescription.
An outrage was heard and people from all over Australia, different ages, races and genders all believed they are being hard done by from this so called ‘ridiculous drastic action’. But here is why their cries and pleas were set aside and not taken into consideration. …show more content…
The evidence from the Australians Bureau of statistics show that between the years 2000 and 2013 there was 1437 codeine related deaths, with more than half of these being people with a history of mental illness and a staggering 36.1% having a substance abuse problem. Since this time period the matter has become ever so much worse. And with many people not just Australians but worldwide becoming dependent on it with Pharmacoepidemiology [farmico- epa-demi-ology] and Drug Safety announcing in 2016 that, 15 million packets of over the counter codeine was purchased as well as 12 million prescribed