Who’s Feeling No Pain? “The latest trendy drugs are old-fashioned painkillers. They’re chic,
mellowing and way addictive.” Time I’m not a big fan of what passes for in-depth analysis at Time, which is sounding more and more like People, but they’re talking about a legitimate issue here. On the front lines I see that the degree of abuse of hydrocodone (Vicodin) and oxycodone (Percocet, Percodan, Oxycontin and others) has skyrocketed. While I believe firmly in adequate pain medicine prescribing, the range of chronic pain complaints for which physicians are doling out these “synthetic morphines” is astounding.