From the # 1 New York Times–bestselling author of Black Hawk Down: The “shocking” story of the country’s unlikeliest drug kingpin (The Baltimore Sun). By the early 1980s, Larry Lavin had everything going for him. He was a bright, charismatic young man who rose from working-class roots to become a dentist with an Ivy League education and a thriving practice, and a beloved father with a well-respected family in one of Philadelphia’s most exclusive suburbs. But behind the façade of his success was a dark secret: Lavin was also the mastermind behind a cocaine empire that spread from Miami to Boston to New Mexico, catering to lawyers, stockbrokers, and other professionals, and generating an annual income of $60 million for the good doctor. Now, Mark Bowden, a “master of narrative journalism” (The New York Times Book Review) tells the harrowing saga of Lavin’s rise and fall in “a shocking American tragedy . . . [that] shoots straight from the hip” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette). “An engrossing crime story and a compelling morality tale.” —The Arizona Republic “Has all the elements of a chilling suspense thriller . . . A smoothly crafted, exciting, can’t-put-it-down book.” —The New Voice (Louisville)

"Dr. James Kauffman and his wife, April, were the perfect couple: a respected endocrinologist and a beautiful radio host. But under the surface lurked a world of drugs, sex, and biker gangs--and Dr. Kauffman would kill to keep it secret ... Told by two accomplished reporters and authors with exclusive insights and details provided by two principle players, this is the story about one man's descent into evil and the people he took with him. It's a story about a doctor who helped flood the streets with opioids, about a husband who hid dark secrets from his wives, and about a man so consumed with greed and arrogance that he thought he could get away with murder"--

SOCIETY NEEDS A WAKE-UP CALL Written for all the tens of thousands of doctors who write prescriptions, the pharmaceutical companies who create these concoctions and dont warn the public of their dangers, and the pharmacies that fill but have the right and oath to deny those quantities. Would you give one of your family members a medication you put on the market but wasnt honest about the serious addiction it carried with it? Written also for the insurance companies that approve payment without checking the interactions and/or questioning the massive quantities. For all of you that fall into the above categories, shame on you. You dont socially, morally, or ethically understand the full ramifications that addiction brings to society and the way it tears families apart. Its repulsive to think how you get away with fueling yourselves with greed. What happened to your oath for your patients? Doctors write prescriptions like the police write tickets all for the money! The trillions of dollars these companies make out of medications that cost pennies . . . Maybe they should be responsible to pay for people who need detox or rehabs and no financial means of getting help for a problem those companies created in the first place . . .

The disturbing connection between well-meaning physicians and the prescription drug epidemic. Three out of four people addicted to heroin probably started on a prescription opioid, according to the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In the United States alone, 16,000 people die each year as a result of prescription opioid overdose. But perhaps the most frightening aspect of the prescription drug epidemic is that it’s built on well-meaning doctors treating patients with real problems. In Drug Dealer, MD, Dr. Anna Lembke uncovers the unseen forces driving opioid addiction nationwide. Combining case studies from her own practice with vital statistics drawn from public policy, cultural anthropology, and neuroscience, she explores the complex relationship between doctors and patients, the science of addiction, and the barriers to successfully addressing drug dependence and addiction. Even when addiction is recognized by doctors and their patients, she argues, many doctors don’t know how to treat it, connections to treatment are lacking, and insurance companies won’t pay for rehab. Full of extensive interviews—with health care providers, pharmacists, social workers, hospital administrators, insurance company executives, journalists, economists, advocates, and patients and their families—Drug Dealer, MD, is for anyone whose life has been touched in some way by addiction to prescription drugs. Dr. Lembke gives voice to the millions of Americans struggling with prescription drugs while singling out the real culprits behind the rise in opioid addiction: cultural narratives that promote pills as quick fixes, pharmaceutical corporations in cahoots with organized medicine, and a new medical bureaucracy focused on the bottom line that favors pills, procedures, and patient satisfaction over wellness. Dr. Lembke concludes that the prescription drug epidemic is a symptom of a faltering health care system, the solution for which lies in rethinking how health care is delivered.

Now a major TV series on Disney+ 'A shocking investigation... Dopesick is essential' The Times 'Unfolds with all the pace of a thriller' Observer 'A deep – and deeply needed – look into the troubled soul of America' Tom Hanks 'Essential reading' New York Times Beth Macy reveals the disturbing truth behind America's opioid crisis and explains how a nation has become enslaved to prescription drugs. This powerful and moving story explains how a large corporation, Purdue, encouraged small town doctors to prescribe OxyContin to a country already awash in painkillers. The drug's dangerously addictive nature was hidden, whilst many used it as an escape, to numb the pain of of joblessness and the need to pay the bills. Macy tries to answer a grieving mother's question – why her only son died – and comes away with a harrowing tale of greed and need.

Living on the street, Dr. George ran a prostitution and drug dealing business to feed his addiction to sex and drugs. His life spiraled out of control, leading him to the confines of a prison cell. When released on probation he risked it all on a drug blow out. This was the catalyst that started the intentional climb towards a life of freedom. In this book, Dr. George guides the reader through his personal story and how he used the power of intention to change his life.

An urgent picture of medical care in our cities, written by an emergency room physician (and co-author of the New York Times bestseller The Pact) who grew up in the very neighborhood he is now serving “A pull-no-punches look at health care from a seldom-heard sector . . . Living and Dying isn’t a sky-is-falling chronicle. It’s a real, gutsy view of a city hospital.”—Essence In this book, Dr. Sampson Davis looks at the healthcare crisis in the inner city from a rare perspective: as a doctor who works on the front line of emergency medical care in the community where he grew up, and as a member of that community who has faced the same challenges as the people he treats every day. He also offers invaluable practical advice for those living in such communities, where conditions like asthma, heart disease, stroke, obesity, and AIDS are disproportionately endemic. Dr. Davis’s sister, a drug addict, died of AIDS; his brother is now paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair as a result of a bar fight; and he himself did time in juvenile detention—a wake-up call that changed his life. He recounts recognizing a young man who is brought to the E.R. with critical gunshot wounds as someone who was arrested with him when he was a teenager during a robbery gone bad; describes a patient whose case of sickle-cell anemia rouses an ethical dilemma; and explains the difficulty he has convincing his landlord and friend, an older woman, to go to the hospital for much-needed treatment. With empathy and hard-earned wisdom, Living and Dying in Brick City is an important resource guide for anyone at risk, anyone close to those at risk, and anyone who cares about the fate of our cities.

Presents a very detailed account, including the English and European context, of the Lopez Affair, involving Dr. Roderigo Lopez, who gained wealth via international trade and became physician to Queen Elizabeth I. At the same time, he was a spy, with multiple masters, in England and abroad. His downfall and execution on the false charge of attempted regicide stemmed from political rivalry in England. His high status was related to the advantages, such as widespread contacts, that stemmed from his Converso background. Contemporary stereotyped attitudes toward Jews were reflected in Marlowe's "Jew of Malta" and Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice."

A comprehensive portrait of a uniquely American epidemic -- devastating in its findings and damning in its conclusions The opioid epidemic has been described as "one of the greatest mistakes of modern medicine." But calling it a mistake is a generous rewriting of the history of greed, corruption, and indifference that pushed the US into consuming more than 80 percent of the world's opioid painkillers. Journeying through lives and communities wrecked by the epidemic, Chris McGreal reveals not only how Big Pharma hooked Americans on powerfully addictive drugs, but the corrupting of medicine and public institutions that let the opioid makers get away with it. The starting point for McGreal's deeply reported investigation is the miners promised that opioid painkillers would restore their wrecked bodies, but who became targets of "drug dealers in white coats." A few heroic physicians warned of impending disaster. But American Overdose exposes the powerful forces they were up against, including the pharmaceutical industry's coopting of the Food and Drug Administration and Congress in the drive to push painkillers -- resulting in the resurgence of heroin cartels in the American heartland. McGreal tells the story, in terms both broad and intimate, of people hit by a catastrophe they never saw coming. Years in the making, its ruinous consequences will stretch years into the future.