Drug Dealers Try to Open Pharmacies for Over the Counter Addicts

A crack down on prescription drug abuse in Florida left many dealers scrambling

When there is a will, there is a way. Florida has seen an increase in pharmacies opening up since launching Operation Prescriptions for Death that banned doctors from refilling pills in their offices.

USA Today reports:

In Florida, hundreds of people tried to open pharmacies after the state barred doctors from dispensing the narcotics directly from their clinics and forced patients to fill their prescriptions at pharmacies. Others moved their operations to Georgia, state police and federal agents say.

"Traffickers adapt to situations," says Mark Trouville, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration's field offices in Florida. "We knew once we put pressure on the pill mills, the wrong people would start opening pharmacies."

Florida was the nation's epicenter of prescription-painkiller distribution until the state enacted laws last year aimed at pill mills — clinics where doctors perform cursory examinations on people with dubious injuries and dispense addictive painkillers.