When hundreds of former NFL players sued the league
in May, alleging that teams illegally supplied them with prescription
drugs to keep them on the field, the federal government took notice.
The Drug Enforcement Administration has opened an
investigation that will explore how teams obtain and distribute
prescription drugs, including narcotics like Vicodin, Percodan and Percocet as
well as anti-inflammatories such as Toradol, according to the New York Daily News.
“The allegations in our lawsuit, that the NFL has
violated state and federal drug laws, have been confirmed by over 1,300 former
NFL players,” Steve Silverman, an attorney for the former players, told the New
York Daily News. “We are pleased to learn that the DEA and United States
Department of Justice are also taking our clients’ allegations seriously and
are actively protecting the welfare of NFL players.”
“They want to find out who provided and distributed
the drugs to football players,” one source told the newspaper.
The 1995 book “You’re OK, It’s Just A Bruise”
exposed the ugly shoot-’em-up, send-’em-out medical culture of the Oakland
Raiders almost two decades ago, but former players say cavalier
distribution of painkillers has been a league-wide problem.
“It was pretty free and loose,” said former Detroit
Lion wide receiver J.D. Hill (above), who played from 1971 to 1977. “It was pretty
free and loose.”
One of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit against the
NFL, Hill recalled going on the team plane after games and accepting pain
medication that was offered with no more formality than a question about
whether he was hurting. Hill said team personnel never told players about
possible side effects of medications.
Hill said players were not warned that they should
drive after taking certain pills, that they should not share their medication
with teammates and that they needed to be careful which medications
they took simultaneously.
“I didn’t have a prescription,” Hill said. “It was
just, I was in pain, and so therefore I was given pills to kill the pain.”
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