By: Mark Lowery, Content Editor

July 25, 2014

FDA has approved a new oxycodone painkiller that’s designed to be more difficult for drug abusers to exploit. Targiniq ER (Purdue Pharma) is an extended-release tablet that combines oxycodone, the active ingredient in OxyContin, with the drug naloxone. The latter is used to reverse the overdose effects of opioids. Targiniq ER was approved for daily, round-the-clock, long-term pain treatment that does not respond to other medications. It is also said to be more difficult, but not impossible, to abuse.

 

Public health crisis

“The FDA is committed to combating the misuse and abuse of all opioids, and the development of opioids that are harder to abuse is needed in order to help address the public health crisis of prescription drug abuse in the [United States],” said Sharon Hertz, deputy director of the FDA Division of Anesthesia, Analgesia and Addiction Products.

According to FDA, if the Targiniq ER pills are crushed and then snorted or injected, the naloxone will block the euphoric effects of the oxycodone. However, FDA officials concede that abusers can simply swallow the tablets instead of crushing them.

Overdose deaths linked to painkillers such as OxyContin and Vicodin (16,500 in 2010) have quadrupled since 1990, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.