Prescription drugs can help you feel better, it can also be a huge addiction for Central Ohioans.
Prescription drugs abuse is rising every year, and it's young adults who have begun abusing these drugs at alarming rates.
CHILLICOTHE, Ohio -- Seven people were arrested in Hocking County on Monday for trafficking the painkiller oxycontin.
In Ross County, officials have seen nearly 20 overdose cases in the last three straight years. Now the push is underway to find a way to get people clean, and get those numbers down.
Kelly Johnson lives in Chillicothe and has long struggled with back trouble. Tuesday, she picked up a prescription from a local pharmacy, and said hopes she will be able to hang on to the pills this time.
"Two times, (we) had medicine stolen from us. People know if you have a health problem and, if you do, you are a target," Johnson says.
Ross County Coroner Dr. John Gabis is front and center on the fight. He says its naive to think the problem can be wiped out, but says sitting and doing nothing is costing lives.
Gabis says, "If I have one legacy it's (that) I prevented one death, that's what we are looking for."
As a doctor, Gabis said he has had to get tough with patients.
"I've looked at people and said, 'I can't do this for you. It's not the right thing," he says.
It's a team effort from prosecutors to pharmacies.
Pharmacy workers check patient profiles, talk with doctors and check databases.
Within a 15-year period, the number of teen and young adults abusing prescription pain killers like oxycontin and vicodin has grown five fold from 400,000 in the mid 80's to 2 million in the new millennium.
In 2000, 43 percent of those who ended up in the emergency room for drug overdoses were because of misusing prescription drugs.
In 2008, 15.2 million Americans took a prescription drug for a non-medical purpose.
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