Meier, Barry

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MEIER, Barry

PERSONAL:

Male.

ADDRESSES:

Office—New York Times, 229 West 43rd. St., New York, NY 10036.

CAREER:

Journalist and author. New York Times, New York, NY, reporter.

AWARDS, HONORS:

George Polk Journalism Award, 2003, for health care reporting.

WRITINGS:

Pain Killer: A "Wonder" Drug's Trail of Addiction and Death, Rodale (Emmaus, PA), 2003.

SIDELIGHTS:

Journalist Barry Meier began covering the potential abuse of the powerful pain medication OxyContin in a series of New York Times articles culminating in his 2003 book, Pain Killer: A "Wonder" Drug's Trail of Addiction and Death. Oxycodone is the drug's key active ingredient, and OxyContin contains about twice the amount of this ingredient as other oxycodone-based painkillers. In a CNN interview printed in the America's Intelligence Wire, Meier told host Carol Lin, "It's sort of the nuclear weapon in the painkiller arsenal. And when kids get a hold of it, when people who misuse or abuse the drug [get] a hold of it, they have [a] treasure trove of narcotic in front of them."

In the book, Meier delves into the roots of this impending public health catastrophe and becomes enmeshed in a rural Virginia town, where a high school cheerleader addicted to OxyContin overdoses. Meier describes the battle of Art Van Zee, a Lee County, Virginia, physician who comes across the OxyContin abuse and suspects that teenage use is widespread when he treats Lindsay Myers, the cheerleader. Before long, OxyContin is known as "hillbilly heroin" because of its initial popularity in rural and suburban areas of Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Maine. Van Zee and Drug Enforcement Agency staffers begin to put pressure on the drug's manufacturer to reformulate the drug so it is not so addictive when abused and to look at their heavy marketing campaigns targeting physicians. "You know, well, there's blame to be [placed]around here," Meier told CNN reporter Daryn Kagan, as quoted in America's Intelligence Wire. "Regulators need to take better action, doctors need to take better action, drug companies need to take better action."

Writing in the Fort Worth Star Telegram, Cecil Johnson called the book a "penetrating examination of the history of that drug." From the point of lawsuits, Trial contributor Diane Fenner noted that "for readers who have been skeptical about the viability of OxyContin cases, the book may whet their appetite enough for another look." Eris Weaver, writing in Library Journal, thought that "the sensationalist title makes the author's bias clear." But the reviewer added that "the book does a good job" of explaining that the pharmaceutical industry's goal—like that of any other industry—is profit, and that this goal sometimes clashes with a drug's public benefit.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

America's Intelligence Wire, October 10, 2003, Miles O'Brien, interview with Meier; October 11, 2003, Carol Lin, interview with Meier; October 13, 2003, Daryn Kagan, interview with Meier.

Fort Worth Star Telegram, November 11, 2003, Cecil Johnson, review of Pain Killer: A "Wonder" Drug's Trail of Addiction and Death.

Library Journal, November 15, 2003, Eris Weaver, review of Pain Killer, p. 92.

New York Times Book Review, January 4, 2004, Christine Kenneally, review of Pain Killer, p. 16.

Trial, May, 2004, Diane Fenner, review of Pain Killer, p. 90.