republished & reported in youarewithinthenorms.com
NORMAN J. CLEMENT, RPH., DDS, NORMAN L. CLEMENT, PHARM-TECH, MALACHI F. MACKANDAL, PHARMD, BELINDA BROWN-PARKER, IN THE SPIRIT OF JOSEPH SOLVO, ESQ., INC., SPIRIT OF REV. IN THE SPIRIT OF WALTER R. CLEMENT, BS., MS., MBA. HARVEY JENKINS, MD, PH.D., IN THE SPIRIT OF C.T. VIVIAN, JELANI ZIMBABWE CLEMENT, BS., M.B.A., IN THE SPIRIT OF THE HON. PATRICE LUMUMBA, IN THE SPIRIT OF ERLIN CLEMENT SR., EVELYN J. CLEMENT, IN THE SPIRIT OF WALTER F. WRENN III., MD., JULIE KILLINGSWORTH, RENEE BLARE, RPH, DR. TERENCE SASAKI, MD LESLY POMPY MD., CHRISTOPHER RUSSO, MD., NANCY SEEFELDT, IN THE SPIRIT OF WILLIE GUINYARD BS., JOSEPH WEBSTER MD., MBA, ANGELA GREENE, BEVERLY C. PRINCE MD., FACS., NEIL ARNAND, MD., IN THE SPIRIT OF RICHARD KAUL, MD., IN THE SPIRIT OF FOREST TENNANT, MD, IN THE SPIRIT OF LEROY BAYLOR, JAY K. JOSHI MD., MBA, AISHA GARDNER, ADRIENNE EDMUNDSON, ESTER HYATT PH.D., WALTER L. SMITH BS., IN THE SPIRIT OF BRAHM FISHER ESQ., MICHELE ALEXANDER MD., CUDJOE WILDING BS, MARTIN NJOKU, BS., RPH., IN THE SPIRIT OF DEBRA LYNN SHEPHERD, BERES E. MUSCHETT, STRATEGIC ADVISORS
MEDICAL BOARD OVERREACH
health authorities and policymakers historically ignored the online reports of families
News-The document and research you shared regarding Dr. Stefan Kertesz and the CSI: OPIOIDs study represent one of the most critical, rigorous scientific efforts to force the government and public health authorities to face the reality of patient suicides
Because health authorities and policymakers historically ignored the online reports of families whose loved ones died following forced tapers, this study builds an undeniable, peer-reviewed database that cannot be easily dismissed by bureaucratic oversight.
1-The Strategy of Building an Undeniable Registry
When federal agencies refuse to track the negative outcomes of their own policies, independent scientific registries act as a tool of institutional accountability.
Overcoming Plausible Deniability: By building a formalized registry of individuals who have died by suicide following a reduction or stoppage of their opioid medication, Dr. Kertesz’s team is removing the government’s excuse of “lack of data”.
The Power of Psychological Autopsies: Conducting in-depth, one-on-one interviews with the survivors allows researchers to isolate the specific demographic, societal, and clinical factors that trigger these suicidal crises. This effectively maps out the exact trajectory of harm caused by forced medical transitions.
Targeting the VA Infrastructure: Notably, this study is supported by a Veterans Administration grant (CSI:OPIOIDs-V). Because the VA is a federal entity, embedding this research directly into their funding stream forces the federal government to internally document the deadly cost of aggressive opioid reductions on veterans.
2-Moving from Tragedy to “Systematic Change”
As the study notes, until the medical system looks closely at individual tragedies, it cannot achieve the kind of systematic changes in healthcare required to protect patients.
Data generated by the CSI:OPIOIDs study is utilized to strip away the “blind metric” defense from insurance companies and regulatory bodies:
The Failure of Blanket Tapering: The research explicitly addresses the reality that while some patients might tolerate a medication change, others are gravely harmed, a fact supported by an increasing body of research that the DEA and corporate pharmacy algorithms try to overlook.
Creating Legal and Clinical Standards: When peer-reviewed papers are published out of universities like UAB and the VA Medical Center, they become clinical evidence. If a doctor or hospital system forces a patient off medication against their will and a tragedy occurs, the patient’s family can use Dr. Kertesz’s published findings in a malpractice lawsuit to prove the medical provider acted against established scientific warnings.
3. Bridging the Trust Gap
The study notes that one reason this critical research hasn’t been done effectively before is the massive logistical challenges and trust barriers across patient communities, families, and policymakers. Pain patients are often terrified to speak out out of fear of being blacklisted from care. By using structured, ethical review board-approved academic frameworks, advocates like Anne Fuqua and Kate Nicholson are safely gathering the evidence needed to challenge federal policy without exposing vulnerable, living patients to further state scrutiny.
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Dr. Stefan Kertesz’s research and advocacy are actively exposing how the government’s metric for “winning” the opioid crisis—solely counting a drop in prescription numbers—functions like a false body count while masking widespread patient suffering and death
Focusing on the first and third strategies from the earlier table provides concrete pathways for leveraging his team’s data to confront corporate discrimination and systemic corruption.
Strategy 1: Weaponizing Civil Rights Laws (The ADA Leverage)
When politicians and corporate leaders ignore tragic stories, they must be met with the financial threat of federal civil rights litigation. Because severe chronic pain frequently qualifies as a legal disability, denying essential care violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
Confronting Corporate Discrimination: Major pharmacy chains (like CVS or Walgreens) and corporate hospital systems often use automated, proprietary screening algorithms. These systems flag patients requiring high stable doses as “high-risk liabilities,” leading to sudden, non-consensual tapers or outright denials of care. Under Title III of the ADA, it is illegal for places of public accommodation to deny services to individuals based on their medical disability
How Dr. Kertesz’s Work Empowers the Legal Battle: For an ADA lawsuit to succeed, lawyers must prove that a corporate policy causes systemic, predictable harm rather than just isolated incidents. The CSI:OPIOIDs study provides the necessary data. By compiling a formalized, academic registry of deaths by suicide following forced prescription cuts, this research establishes a definitive baseline of “grave harm”. Civil rights attorneys can present this peer-reviewed data to a judge to prove that corporate policy is directly endangering a protected class of disabled Americans.
The Goal: A series of high-impact, class-action discrimination lawsuits filed by civil rights groups. Once corporate legal teams calculate that a blanket anti-opioid policy will cost them millions in federal civil rights settlements, corporate compliance departments will force health executives to stop blocking legitimate care.
Strategy 3: Exploiting Federal False Claims Acts (Targeting Institutional Fraud)
The third strategy focuses on exposing financial corruption and regulatory hypocrisy within healthcare networks that receive public funding.
Exposing Healthcare Fraud: Corporate hospital systems and public healthcare networks rely heavily on billions of dollars in federal Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements. To legally receive these funds, these networks must certify that they are meeting standard medical guidelines and providing individualized, medically necessary care.
The Violation: When a hospital network implements an internal, unwritten policy to systematically force taper or purge pain patients from their databases just to satisfy a “narcotic quota,” they are committing fraud. They are taking taxpayer money meant for the disabled while executing blanket, administrative actions that reject individualized care.
How Dr. Kertesz’s Work Empowers the Fight: Bureaucracies consistently hide behind plausible deniability, asserting that patient tapers are safe and standard. Dr. Kertesz’s research actively strips away this defense by demonstrating that the drop in legal prescriptions has occurred alongside skyrocketing illicit street overdose deaths—highlighting a completely broken system.
The Goal: Utilizing Qui Tam (whistleblower) lawsuits and filing formal fraud complaints with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights. When independent doctors use academic data to blow the whistle on hospital networks for putting metrics over human lives, the threat of the federal government freezing Medicare funds forces hospital boards to immediately dismantle their restrictive prescribing limits.
Summary of Next Steps
Dr. Kertesz’s work, which is actively supported by the Veterans Health Administration, changes the entire landscape of this fight. It shifts the community’s standing from a marginalized group begging for mercy to a scientifically backed movement armed with legal evidence.
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We need to measure the opioid crisis differently
Dr. Tennant’s life represents a tireless battle to give scientific visibility to invisible physical suffering, leaving behind a blueprint for compassionate, specialized neurological care.
“drug dealers in white coats” for what may actually be good-faith medical disagreements or errors..”
…from Ruan vs. United States Case 21-1014
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