DRUG COMPANY GRANT

OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma announced Wednesday that it is making a 3.4 million dollar grant to Harm Reduction Therapeutics, a Pittsburgh-based nonprofit, that’s developing a low-cost naloxone nasal spray to counter the effects of an opioid overdose. Over a thousand lawsuits have been filed against Purdue and other drug companies for using deceptive marketing practices to encourage heavy prescribing of the powerful and addictive painkillers. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said drug overdoses killed an estimated 72,000 Americans last year – about 10 percent more than in 2016 – with the majority of the deaths involving opioids.