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Crackdown On Prescription Drugs Leading To Other Problems In SE Ohio
< < Back to crackdown-prescription-drugs-leading-other-problems-se-ohioThe crackdown on prescription drugs has resulted in the increased use of other illegal drugs in Ohio.
Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine says more people are turning to heroin.
"As we push back on the prescription drug problem, I think the one new thing that we're seeing and it's really a continuation but it's worse… It's like when you push in a balloon one place, something jumps out somewhere else, that balloon jumps out and what we're seeing jump out is heroin," says DeWine.
Ohio Governor John Kasich signed a bill in May heavily restricting how much a doctor could prescribe to his patients.
But, Pike County Sheriff Richard Henderson says the lack of access to prescription drugs in his county isn't leading to heroin.
Pike County busted 10 meth labs all last year and already have three or four busts in the first month of this year.
He claims the new prescription drug crackdown could be the reason for the boost in arrests for meth.
"I think a lot of it to is the change with prescription medications being harder to get sometimes. It reverts back to the meth," says Henderson.
DeWine says law enforcement has shut down 12 pill mills in Scioto County that were operating last year.
Scioto County is the known as the epicenter of the prescription drug problem and is only 30 miles away from Pike County.