Kathe Sackler proud of OxyContin despite US opioids deaths, book says

Patrick Radden Keefe's Empire of Pain recounts how Sackler, seven of her relatives and Purdue Pharma were sued

By the time a class-action lawyer asked Kathe Sackler whether her family's firm, Purdue Pharma, and its prescription painkiller OxyContin bore any responsibility for the US opioid crisis, a shocking 450,000 Americans had died of opioid-related overdoses in the 23 years since the pills hit the market.

But Sackler, after some hedging and deflecting, asserted not only that the family had nothing to be ashamed of or apologize for but that she deserved credit for coming up with the idea" of OxyContin, which was a very good medicine", according to a forthcoming book by the journalist and author Patrick Radden Keefe.