Two decades into the pain revolution, a consensus had emerged that opiates were unhelpful, even risky, for some varieties of chronic pain—back pain, headaches, and fibromyalgia among them. Several clinics and doctors I spoke with had policies against using them for those ailments. One 2007 survey of studies of back pain and opiates found that “use disorders” were common among patients, and “aberrant” use behavior occurred in up to 24 percent of the cases. It was unclear, the authors found, whether opiates had an effect on back pain in the long term.
