The DEA hadn’t paid much attention to distributors before, and that suited the companies just fine. Then, in 2005, Rannazzisi came knocking. The gruff, sharp-tongued DEA agent arranged a series of one-on-one meetings with the nation’s largest distributors—McKesson, Cardinal Health, and AmerisourceBergen. The three companies controlled 85 percent of drug shipments. They had the buying power to put a stranglehold on painkiller mania; Americans were consuming more than 80 percent of the world’s supply of oxycodone, and 99 percent of its hydrocodone.
