Be Informed. Be Well. With John Malanca

Fighting for the Rights of Pain Patients and their Doctors with Claudia Merandi & Dr. Arnold Feldman

March 16, 2021 John Malanca Season 1 Episode 33
Be Informed. Be Well. With John Malanca
Fighting for the Rights of Pain Patients and their Doctors with Claudia Merandi & Dr. Arnold Feldman
Show Notes Transcript

Fighting for the Rights of Pain Patients and their Doctors with Claudia Merandi & Dr. Arnold Feldman


Join John Malanca as he discusses the struggle Chronic Pain Patients endure and the threat to their doctors who prescribe opioids responsibly for these unfortunate individuals.

Did you know the same surgeon who just performed complex spinal surgery without oversight, is regulated by the government, CDC, DEA, insurance companies, Medicare, Medicaid and the Medical Board in your state, when they write a prescription of opioids in the treatment of short-term pain, making recovery challenging?  

Did you know that if you suffer from chronic pain, your chances of obtaining relief with a legal and appropriate opioid prescription is nearly impossible?

Did you know, chronic pain patients rarely get euphoric and rarely if ever seek out illegal drugs?

Tune in and watch the truth about the government’s interference of the patient/doctor relationship in the management of chronic pain in America.

Fighting for the Rights of Pain Patients and their Doctors with Claudia Merandi & Dr. Arnold Feldman

John Malanca 0:03
 Welcome back everybody. This is John Malanca with United pace through be informed and be well today I have a returning guest a dear friend of the show, Claudia Miranda. Hey, Claudia.

Claudia Merandi 0:12
 Hi john. Thanks for having me back.

John Malanca 0:14
 Thanks for coming on and then Dr. Feldman down there in sunny Florida, so he would shine.

Arnold Feldman, MD 0:19
 JOHN what’s off? Yes, sir. Thanks for inviting me I appreciate

John Malanca 0:25
 thanks for being on This is a serious topic and so clearly I’m gonna read your bio here and and what you do. Claudia Miranda is the founder of the national don’t punish pain rally organization. Claudia is a retired court reporter, self published author and is from East Providence, Rhode Island. As a person living with severe Crohn’s disease as a child she witnessed firsthand the challenges a person with pain encounters when trying to obtain adequate pain management. Claudia in 2017 created the don’t punish pain rally organization focusing on organizing protest rallies throughout the country for people with pain who can no longer access pain management due to the 2016 CDC opioid prescribing guidelines. She started with five members. Today there are 1000 members across the country with chapters in Canada, Australia as well as the United Kingdom and Korea Claudia remains vigilant and bringing awareness to the anti opiate crusades, Crusaders cuse me who are profiting off the overdosing epidemic. Today, Claudia works with doctors throughout the country who have been targeted unfairly in this is what’s doing Dr. Feldman by governmental agencies and medical boards. And so welcome, Claudia. And then Dr. Feldman, if you want to share a little about your bio, sorry, I don’t I don’t have that up up here.

Unknown Speaker 1:40
 Well, I would be I’ll try to keep it short go. You mentioned in your introduction to Claudia, she has first hand knowledge of the problem. Because Because she suffers. Now, I did not have first hand knowledge and till I became a medical student, which was in Philadelphia. And so I was at the Medical College of Pennsylvania way back in the day before there was anything known as pain management, it did not exist. In other words, during those times, all doctors considered it their duty to take care of patients in pain. And it was only in the 80s that doctors became more serious about it. And there were a lot of reasons for that. But let’s forget about that. So pain management emerged as a specialty now I have been in it since the beginning. Before there were there were pain clinics, I had the first pain clinic in the state, arguably the first pain clinic in the state of Mississippi and the state of Alabama, way back in the 80s. And people you know, they respected what I was doing. But obviously something changed along the way. So there was this awareness like a renaissance of of pain awareness. And this is what we’re dealing with today. And now there is a anti pain movement, which has become very powerful because of things that we’ll discuss. So me, I became an anesthesiologist moved on from medical school, to an internship in internal medicine at CIT Thomas Jefferson, which is a very excellent Medical College in Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. Then I went to Harvard, and I was lucky enough I don’t know why they accepted me. But they did. And I completed my training in anesthesiology and Boston, moved down south went into the private practice of anesthesiology, and within a number of years, couple of years, I opened the first pain clinic because there was this definite need. People thought I had the skills and and I became a pain management specialist. And I did clinical anesthesia for surgery for 15 or 20 years. And at the same time I did pain management. In around the year 2002 or three, I dedicated 100% of my time to pain management, built a clinic of which there I don’t think there were very many like it in the United States. I went back and traveled all over the world to learn to do spine surgery, laser based minimally invasive surgery and innovated a number of things. So I’ve seen as I think in the movie, mommy dearest, I think Joan Crawford said Faye Dunaway said, this ain’t my first time around the rodeo fellas. So what we’re seeing now is is just a we’re back in 1914. So that’s why Claudia and I met.

John Malanca 4:42
 And thank you for that for that bio there. You know, why did it change? Because you you started off saying that this is the day when doctors really took took care of their patients when it came to pain management and and you said it kind of changed in the 80s was it that there be due to Reagan or what was what was the reason behind that?

Unknown Speaker 5:00
 Well, obviously, there was a lot of reasons. But one of the things, obviously, some, you know, advances in science, you know, can and often do cause changes. So most of you wouldn’t be aware of this. It’s such an esoteric point. But in the 70s is when people experimented with the interest final use of morphine, in rats, and researchers found that tiny doses of morphine applied to the central nervous system can cause pain relief, without any any mental changes, any dysphoria, any sedation. So guess what ronald reagan gets shot by john Hinckley, and who I believe he was the first American to receive a shot of interest final morphine, Ronald Reagan. Well, I read about this in around 19. Whenever that was 1981, I think Yeah. And I thought to myself, I thought to myself, well, if this was good enough for the president, why isn’t everybody using this and after some research, I wasn’t the first but we started using what we call neurally, applied opiates, meaning opiates applied to the central nervous system via the surgical implantation of pumps, spinal morphine pump system, of which I became very expert and very, very convinced that that there is a better way to take care of pain. Well, at the same time, with that awareness, there were some changes in the pharmacology of opiates, nd and the introduction of newer drugs. When I say newer drugs, we’re talking about Oxycontin, which is an old drug repurposed in a new package, meaning rt codo been around since, you know, 1920s. Fat nil, which had been around since the late 50s. I used it in surgery all the time, as an anesthesiologist literally every day. It’s a great drug, if you know how to use it. It was never intended for obviously, for street view. So there became this awareness after Reagan, that we can do a better job. The pharmaceutical companies that make drugs sell their drugs, and they marketed them in the beginning, I think appropriately. And then there was this overzealous marketing of of well intended drugs or, or safe drugs that now are, as they say, in Germany verboten. So we cannot speak of these things, we cannot use these things, we cannot use them for their intended purposes. So, for lack of a better term, there’s been a backlash, as there often is, and the pendulum has swung the opposite way.

John Malanca 7:48
 Yeah, you know, and in Claudia, Thanks for your patience or you’re like, Hello, I’m here. I’m here.

Unknown Speaker 7:54
 I’m here.

Unknown Speaker 7:56
 Sorry, Claudia. Sorry.

Unknown Speaker 7:57
 Not at all. I love it. That’s music to my ears whenever Dr. Feldman speaks,

Unknown Speaker 8:03
 oh, good, good, good. Good.

John Malanca 8:05
 You know, first off, I have to applaud you because not too many people stand up for their rights. And, and and what you’ve done with your dope punish pain rally and your followers, you know, I do applaud you. Because a lot of people just sit back and go, Oh, this is the law. I have to teach take it. And then you go into a slump of depression, you know, and I’ve talked to many patients who’ve gone through depression, some are low longer here, because of suicide or, or whatever. And, you know, so I, I know you’re in pain every day. I know, we’ve had our colleague and friend Beth dastan. Here, she’s in pain every day a fibromyalgia patient, you know, and you guys shared what a lot of pain patients going through when they go to refill the prescription. You know, it’s kind of looking at the pharmacist looks at you Okay, I’m going to I’ll fill this for you. But I know what you’re really up to. What do you really know what I’m up to? You felt you sit in my body every day. I mean, that’s wakes up at three or four in the morning to get out of bed at six 630 in the morning to talk about pain. You know and so so I applaud you is what I’m getting on that two of what you what you’ve done. What can you add to that? I know you you’re very involved since the last time you had you on the show and a lot of things have changed. Can you share what you’re going through right now and some laws are you trying to have passion some people here finding I guess if you want to say sure,

Unknown Speaker 9:33
 yeah. Well, you know, things change daily but not much changes for the pain patient because the plight of the pain patient goes unnoticed, unheard. Nobody cares. And, you know, one of my very first interviews I did years ago, was a retired senator and he said nobody cares until it happens to them and that resonates greatly because I’ve since advocated for several lawmakers in Rhode Island who have been become victims of the pain patient genocide. You know, I started off with five members on the don’t punish pain rally organization. And we just hit 17,200. And that’s just on one page. And now I’m on all social media platforms. And the request come rolling in 24 seven to speak with myself to speak with Dr. Feldman. And we in Rhode Island, I’ve been fortunate to get legislation sponsored. I believe it will pass in 2021 we resume session, but that’s just a very small part. You know, what I do in Rhode Island is I I keep a lookout, I monitor what’s happening with the state’s medical boards. Are they terrorizing doctors unfairly is the DEA in my state. So I am definitely a squeaky wheel in 2021. I am committed to investigating prosecutors investigations because I see the trash that the Department of Justice puts out. I’ve sort of shifted gears to working with doctors who have been targeted because without a doctor, there’s no patient. And Dr. Feldman, the one of the very first conversations we’ve had, when I’ve met him we’ve not met in person, but Dr. Feldman and I speak on the phone, sometimes 510 times a day a lot. And he said as long as there’s fair and the clinic, nobody will prescribe and I know your wife was a sufferer. She was quite ill. And when these 2016 CDC guidelines were created, people with cancer were to be exempt. That’s but we knew that would not we knew eventually people with cancer will be stricken and they have been It doesn’t matter if you have cancer. It’s no longer the holy grail of illnesses, whether you have cancer, sickle cell, a rare disease, Crohn’s disease, colitis, fibromyalgia, the government does not care. And they have targeted doctors who prescribe and you know, one of our goals is to get a DEA oversight hearing. Another one of our goals is to get a copy of my bill in all 50 states to protect doctors. Dr. Feldman because of Dr. Feldman, there’s now a class action lawsuit that’s been filed against CVS and Walgreens for discriminating patients at the pharmacy counter. And unfortunately, our country only responds to litigation. litigation, they shall have

John Malanca 12:42
 it the beginning, as you said, hopefully law you’re helping laws Pat, what laws will pass? Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 12:49
 so Rhode Island, the bill number last year was Rhode Island house 7398. And that bill states a chronic intractable patients shall be able to receive long term opioid therapy exempt from the 2016 CDC guidelines and the guidelines are being rewritten. I A lot of people don’t realize that. And they’ll be released in 2022. But they were written they were created in secret. And the FDA distanced themselves because they knew this would be a horror show. It’s very, very bad. It’s a very dire time for people who are sick. And all the media wants to cover is the opioid crisis. We can laugh because we say what opioid crisis in 2019 guess how many overdoses had pain pills in their system? 00. So, people and you know, there’s not enough awareness being brought to what people are really overdosing on. And as a mom to two teenagers, that’s something else I had to fight really hard to get in Rhode Island was to get psats put out by the Rhode Island Department of Health, talking about fentanyl because I’ve got two teenagers and, you know, in their mind, they think people are only overdosing on pain medication. And that couldn’t be the furthest thing from the truth. And that’s why we have to work so much harder. We have to work to change the false narrative surrounding this safety and efficacy of opioids. And we’re doing it but it’s at a glacial pace. So it’s it’s pretty dire.

John Malanca 14:28
 It is and Dr. Feldman, earlier, Claudia said my wife, she passed a pancreatic cancer in 2000. So sorry, and talking about the pain, you know, maybe she was someone who didn’t drink and smoke worked out stayed healthy. And you know, three blood tests came back zero cancer. I mean that that’s how awful pancreatic is, but I remember we came back from Stanford University and they prescribed krint a higher dose. I think the first one was five milligrams or 25 milligrams and we went I went straight to after that appointment, too. Our local CVS. And sorry, we can’t fill it because you already had one. Mike, do you really think we’re faking this right now. So I remember coming out the car, we just tears My eyes. Because I spoke with the pharmacist, the lady there, I said, This is my wife, and she ended up giving it to me. She ended up giving it to me, and she and I, and I remember going in there after she passed, I should I just want to thank you this would happen she just felt she was a in our hands are tied. And it’s awful when the hands are tied. And it’s awful when I hear patients that go back to their doctor who prescribed in the first round of prescriptions and or pharmaceuticals and they won’t refill them. You What do you say is that the doctors are those are the doctors that you’re fighting for? Because they’re being threatened?

Unknown Speaker 15:48
 Well, let me say this, you know, I have all doctors have a, you know, a basic education in medical school. But we all develop certain skills and we go down certain paths. Okay, so I had certain skills I could do for somebody like your wife, I could do celiac Plexus blocks, I could put epidural catheters and I could put spinal pumps in, I did had a lot of tools in my little black bag. So now not everybody had that right now, I’m not a brain surgeon, I can’t do brain surgery, I can can’t do heart surgery, I probably could. But I’ve never done it. But but but let me tell you the top the tie that binds, okay, the tie that binds in the pain in the treatment of really serious pain. And I’m not a big proponent of this, but I have to tell you the truth. What is the tie that binds, I’ll give you an AB choice. It’s either aspirin tablets or opiates, opiates, okay, so any patient that suffers from severe intractable pain can be made better. And when I say made better, I don’t mean cure, but whose life can be improved by the judicious use of opiate medications. And that’s a big if now, who decides the problem we’re having right now. It can be said in two words. And then slash three letters judicious use. And the three letters are Department of Justice. Why is the Department of Justice in the practice of medicine? They have no, in my opinion, they have no legal authority, which has been borne out in the courts. But remember, I said earlier in this conversation, I’m a Jewish person, right? So how is it that the Nazis did everything that they did, and one of the most advanced civilizations that ever was on this planet? It’s because people without authority sees that. And that’s what’s happened to the chronic pain patients, it’s no longer a medical problem. It’s a it’s a legal problem. If that makes sense to Jeff to the audience

John Malanca 17:59
 and and pretty powerful analogy, by the way, so thank you for sharing that. Um, what happens to the patients and this happens, Claudia, I know a patient that you and I are friends with that has gone in and to go refill their prescription and on day 28 and then in the in the in the farm, she says sorry, we gave you 30 pills. You know, we need to wait, you know, two more days. It’s like, how do you how can you gauge you know how much pain I’m in on a daily basis. This happens in the cannabis industry with epidiolex epidiolex you know, I work with a lot of families one of my dear friends her daughter has autism and seizure disorders. And so they have they are prescribed so in the cannabis industry Dr. filmin doctors can recommend medical cannabis now that the government got involved in put a cannabis product a true cannabis product available in the pharmacy they can prescribe it so they say sorry we can’t refill it now because you know, you should have two more days on your on your epidiolex but they don’t know it’s not a it’s not a it’s every patients different than the same thing with the pain patients every patient is different Do you know Walk walk a day in in a pain patient shoes thank goodness I don’t have pain. You know you’ve shared your pain. What do you say for those doctors that are the pharmaceutical won’t fill those in? What do you share? What can you share with the pain patients that are listening that are in the same boat? That’s why you get so many people that call you and contact you on a daily basis because you step up and you let them know they’re not alone. I mean, when Beth shared that she she has Fibromyalgia on the show. Everyone contactors like oh my god, I’m having the same thing. I thought I was alone. And so you standing up for patients, and I applaud you like me. I should have said the beginning. You talk about psats with your children, your don’t punish pain rally website. You have a holster. Are files from flyers how to create a fire the handouts. I mean, you’re really is this self funded?

Unknown Speaker 20:08
 Oh yeah, this is self funded the don’t punish pain rally is not a nonprofit we accept donations at the doctor patient forum, which is a nonprofit organization. The doctor patient form is run on blood, sweat and tears and not you know, we have to we have to protest the next time. I just actually organize my finale rally. That’s my last rally. But I will organize one protest a year in DC and we protest an October of 2021. Providing things with COVID. You know, we have to monitor that situation. And that that is called the 500 white coat March. And we want doctors to attend doctors don’t have a voice and you know, when you go to the pharmacy, one day before you’re supposed to get your medication filled, that could actually trigger a doctor getting rated because there’s such stringent guidelines. But most people don’t understand you know, if you call CVS and ask for an early fill, you could lose your pain management. If you use cannabis or create them, you will lose your pain management because cannabis is not legal. So, you know for your listeners, they need to be aware if you have a contract with pain management, cannabis THC, CBD credo melatonin in some cases are all no no’s because you’ve got a police officer who’s writing your script for your pain medication and it it’s just a disgusting attack. What’s let me say this before I forget, Dr. Feldman is the only doctor in the country who gets on the phone with patients. And because these people have nobody and oftentimes we are their last phone call before they attempt to take their life and we have to talk both doctors and patients off the rails. You know once a DEA terrorizes a doctor, they’re robbed of their livelihood and their states, your state’s medical board and California. I’m going after them big time right now because of that horrible death certificate project. That was Kamala Harris’s baby. You know, the death certificate project was looking into doctors who had overdoses 10 years ago, and some of these doctors didn’t have overdoses. Some of these people died from natural causes. But the DOJ they’re such cowards, and they have such weak cases that they they lie. And now I question our our federal judges being paid off. The corruption is never ending and the at the end of the day, we have lawmakers, judges, prosecutors, doctors, we have people who are profiting off the fake opioid crisis. But I know something will give because everybody gets sick. One out of four people will get cancer. One out of four people will need pain medication, but these hateful anti opioid Crusaders, they lost a loved one to an overdose. So therefore, if you need pain medication, you must suffer. But now I get requests for people who tell me my son overdosed. He’s dead. He overdosed on fentanyl, but I can’t get pain medication. This was not supposed to happen. My son’s death should not be a reflection of the pain patients suffering. So we’re seeing more conversation but mainstream media. They’re gluttons. They refuse to cover what’s really happening. And it’s, you know, it’s it’s disheartening, because,

Unknown Speaker 24:01
 you know, this

Unknown Speaker 24:02
 past week, I felt like, Oh, you know, there’s nothing rewarding about what we do. We’re unique because most nonprofits can see, you know, what’s rewarding for us is okay, they didn’t blow their heads off. So that’s good, but there’s nothing rewarding, but if we don’t do it, nobody else will. People are afraid of the government. I am not afraid of anybody.

Unknown Speaker 24:27
 Well, no, I am. I’ll tell you.

Unknown Speaker 24:29
 My 19 year old I’m afraid of her. JOHN.

Unknown Speaker 24:34
 Where are you?

John Malanca 24:34
 How tall are you?

Unknown Speaker 24:36
 Oh, I’m five to 120 pounds a

John Malanca 24:39
 day and your King Kong and I love that Beth Beth is like that as well.

Unknown Speaker 24:44
 Yeah, we don’t. Oh, no. And my mom’s in the next room. She’s 85 and I did a tic toc video yesterday about this. One time like seven years ago a doctor accused me of pain catastrophizing, I was admitted with a bowel obstruction and I could see the look on my mom’s face. And I said, Oh my God, this poor guy better run. Because my mom said, How do you have kids? And he said, Yeah, I have a six year old. And she said, Does your six year old have an N g tube in her nose? And he said, No. And my mom says, Well, my kid does. So when you’re a kid has an mg tube and you give me a call, and then I’ll tell you that your kid is making up for pain. So you have to, you have to force people to do the right thing. My approach is a little unorthodox, but that’s all we’ve got.

John Malanca 25:36
 Oh, you’re also mom to you know, and you’re tough and I think you one use your approach comes from you’ll do anything from your for your child and in turn, will you know, really stand up and get get your your rights heard. I want to go into rights, but I also want to go into pain doesn’t discriminate. Disease doesn’t discriminate, and that’s something that we share. Even in the cannabis world. You know, cannabis wasn’t our lifestyle. And Dr. Feldman, I don’t know. Going to surprise you. This is a podcast, my company’s united patients group and we are paying advocates or health advocates as well. You know, helping people avoid the tangled web, whatever it may be, if cannabis, if it’s going through opioids, if it’s going through health and wellness, and so we were we were thrown into this in 2011, my father in law was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer metastasized to the brain. He was given weeks to live, we asked about cannabis for appetite stimulation, not knowing the benefits and the outcome, you still live, you know. And so we’ve seen in light Claudia’s like, wow, you know, and I mean, I called grid Mary Poppins didn’t drink and didn’t smoke type of thing. But it doesn’t it doesn’t discriminate, you know, pain and cancer and ailments do not discriminate. And so you helping the senators, and that’s one thing we’ve had senators contact to say, you know, we I was so anti this, and we were thrown into this world. And now we’re proponents of that. And same thing sounds like that’s happening with you. Our doctor recommended a doctor in Mexico who is based in LA, because he was constantly in court fighting for his patients rights. And he said, you know, what, I’m out of here, I’m gonna go down, and he’s been out there for 19 years, and he has patients from all over the world to come, he goes, and I don’t have to fight the DA anymore. But he does everything. I spent more time in court than I did talk about litigation, more time in court, than I do with my patients. And I spent with my one. What did you get me? I spent all that time all my time in court. So I’m not going to I’m not going to do this. Your rallies, this argument about justice, your rallies, and your protests, and you have your 500 white coat. rally? Do you do those rallies go anywhere? Did anybody listen? Or do they just look out the window? Go? Here they go again? I mean, what what really? Can you share?

Unknown Speaker 27:55
 Yeah, well, you know, the reason I created the rallies was to get help to the elderly at home. And the only way people find me is through word of mouth. And each time the media would cover local media stations would cover the rally, then, if you’re at home, you’ll see that news that 10 second news about don’t punish pain rally. And that’s all they need to see. And now they can connect with us. So the rallies are necessary, but we don’t have a great turnout. Because a lot of these people, they’re bedridden, and they’re and you know, virtual, virtual anything doesn’t work. That’s a big flop when people say, oh, let’s do a virtual I don’t do anything virtually no, no in person. Um, so, you know, it’s, it’s done something because I started with five members. And I don’t even I mean, look, once you hit once you over 3004, or 5000, you don’t even know most of the people but we have original members. And they say, they asked vote is it worth fighting for, but you have to fight so and you need to you have to protest, you have to be out there, you have to attach a face to the cause. And step one in this whole process is bringing awareness to the issue. We don’t have the money to pay for a national PR campaign. But if we had $5 million, we could do a lot with it. We don’t take money from pharmaceutical pharmaceutical companies and we can’t for the time being because of these hateful, evil people like Andrew kolodny and prop. And these people take millions from pharmaceutical companies, but they accused the pain advocacy groups Oh, well, they get money from opioid manufacturers will so to you. So it’s just one attack after the next the rallies are necessary to bring awareness because we have the numbers and we have something no other community has. We have the numbers. 50 million Americans suffer with chronic pain. And when taken as prescribed and stored correctly, opiates are safe and effective. And if you need cannabis, you should be able to get cannabis. And if you need kratom, same with kratom. But you can’t get anything now. Sure, what

John Malanca 30:18
 do you when you’re on last time I had a lot of people ride right in as well as doctor saying, Come on, you know, opioids, they lead to other thing they need to desk you know, they people just want to get high with it. And

Unknown Speaker 30:30
 yeah,

Unknown Speaker 30:32
 if you’re an addict, absolutely, because I advocate for people with addiction. So if you’re predisposed to addiction, you know, you have to, and that’s why they’re prescribed in a crunch in a controlled setting. For that reason, but um, if you’re predisposed to addiction, you will probably get hooked on opiates if not taken in a controlled setting. But the government’s taken away the right to even see a doctor now doctors just won’t prescribe. They’re like, forget it.

Unknown Speaker 31:04
 What do you do tonight? Can I make a comment about that? Of course, please, this is all based on false science. So I remember a long time ago, you remember, there, there are some basic medical specialties we think of surgery, gynecology, neurosurgery, internal medicine, cardiology. So now there’s a specialty been around a couple decades, or maybe three, four decades, addiction knowledge, you’ve heard, I’m an addiction specialist. Well, I talked to an addictionologist, many years ago in the 80s, when I first started doing pain, because occasionally we would cross paths where a patient, you know what you would find out this patient was really an addict, not a pain patient. And it was, you know, it was a learning experience to learn because Because remember, to be an addict, you have to be able to fool a lot of people. So this addictionologist in Mississippi, believe it or not, that’s where I lived. said to me, we were working together to help this, it was a nurse. And he said to me, Arnold, take this as gospel, you cannot make somebody an addict. They’re born an addict. And it’s just their choice of substances or their choice of behavior. So I took that very seriously, meaning addicts are going to be addicted to something. And so when you make when you make these substances, or you, you have a prohibition like system, then these peak, people get into trouble. Because they have to in order to access their drug of choice, they have to access illegal activities. And that’s why our prisons are full of people that should not be there. Now. there’s a there’s a field now that’s developed called harm reduction. In harm reduction is kind of and I don’t agree with all of that all of this, but harm reduction is is kind of like confession in the Catholic Church.

John Malanca 33:19
 I don’t think you’re Jewish. I think you’re I think you’re a Catholic over here. Could

Unknown Speaker 33:23
 you set aside probably gospel heaven, and

Unknown Speaker 33:26
 now you’re talking to

Unknown Speaker 33:26
 you? Well, you know, Jesus is over your head to Dr. Calm and I don’t know, he’s just Jesus was Jewish. Do you know? Oh, yes. Yeah. So the the harm reduction specialists say, or the harm reduction believer say we have a problem, meaning addiction, and we just have to deal with the problem. We’re not going to worry about curing these people, at least in the short term. So what has happened, and I want them I want the public to understand this. The somebody said a long time ago, I don’t know who it was, you know, if you want to know why something’s happening, follow the money, right? Follow the money. So pain patients are a big pot of money, either either Medicare expenses, Medicaid expenses, private insurance, expenses, workman’s compensation, expenses, disability payments, pharmaceutical companies making money, medical device companies making money, so they want the money, but they really don’t care about the human being. So what has happened is Andrew kolodny, who’s just a frontman for a bunch of, of, how should we say unethical pharmaceutical companies, looked at a Purdue company, a Jewish family that made a lot of money, selling Oxycontin, and that’s a whole different issue. Obviously, I don’t know these people, but I’ve been around since the beginning. And they saw the billions and they said, We want those billions. And now we what they’re trying to do, and they’re becoming successful is to substitute a drug called buprenorphine, Suboxone. Yep. And force met millions and millions and millions of Americans, including people like you and me, Claudia, my wife, people with cancer, people with all kinds of problems forced them to take this drug. And guess what? You remember in Brave New World out this Huxley novel, we all read it in high school to keep people calm. They gave him a drug names so much. That was the name of the drug in Brave New World 1937. So, buprenorphine is the new silver and how did they achieve this goal, and they stand to make billions of dollars, I’m going to tell you a deep dark secret. They they hire influential former congressmen and senators and governors to influence the Department of Health and Human Services to change one diagnostic code. in what’s called the Diagnostic and Statistical, statistical manual five, DSM five, they changed one diagnostic code to opiate use disorder. So for instance, you mentioned your wife, may she rest in peace. She took an opiate for more than a week. But rather than saying her diagnosis was pancreatic cancer, they would say she has an opiate use disorder. So if you make a drug, which, which which, you know, is meant to be taken by addiction patients, which is 2 million Americans about and you extend that to 100 million Americans by changing the classification and coding, guess what, your corporate income goes up 50 times, and it’s lifelong. So that company has the potential to outpace Apple Corporation, because you don’t need to buy an iPhone every day, but you have to take your Suboxone every single day. So this is the biggest ruse that I personally have ever seen. But the good news is Claudia and I are going to sue these people shortly. And we have a research department and we are collecting information that you know you’re not probably not old enough. Do you remember Abscam, Abscam?

Unknown Speaker 37:36
 De entrapped a bunch of New Jersey congressmen and taking bribes from Arab businessmen. Yeah. Do you remember that? Well, this is bigger than Abscam. This is billions and billions and billions of dollars. But they got President Trump so jacked up on this, that he declared the opiate crisis a national emergency. You know, what the opiate crisis is manmade, it is not, it is not a Ebola virus pandemic. And we can change it in one fell swoop by a presidential order a piece of legislation saying the following. Doctors can prescribe medicine, law enforcement officers cannot. That is the conversation we need to be having. So it’s just like marijuana. If you go back to you know, you know, the old movie, Harry anslinger in the 30s, reefer madness. I mean, come on it. The jails are full of people with marijuana conviction. So now they’re getting full of doctors that compassionately treat human beings. And if we don’t put this stuff, a stop to this. Yeah, our society that we know will no longer exist.

John Malanca 38:59
 What a lot of lot happened in 1937, you know, yeah, yeah. You’re my mom. Mom was born as well. What do you say about the and I’m gonna take this other side here. I should take take this up and bring this up, because this is brought up and last time I had Claudia. I mean, what do you say about all the all the rehab centers here in California, Napa Valley, all the way down to Malibu? You know, that’s a that’s a multi billion dollar industry. And a lot of

Unknown Speaker 39:26
 john, you know, what, you know what those recovery centers are doling out Suboxone? Lots and lots of Suboxone, we advocate for people who can’t get off Suboxone. It is a highly addictive, deadly opioid and contrary to what doctors, you know, Ill informed doctors on buprenorphine say, yes, you can overdose on Suboxone, but there’s millions of dollars, billions of dollars invested in this false narrative. Yeah. And if you replace the word Purdue With indivior history is repeating itself this time around with Suboxone, but there’s so much money being fueled into this fake opioid crisis. It’s it’s staggering and every time we research we find more corruptness in and you know, it’s so it’s scary because now they want to approve buprenorphine as the first line of defense to treat chronic pain. But Dr. Feldman can discuss this as well. buprenorphine is a terrible drug to treat pain. It’s a great, I have people who’ve done very well, you know, heroin users who are now on Suboxone. And it’s given them their life. But Dr. Feldman’s wife is a chronic pain patient. She’s not an addict, so she shouldn’t be taking Suboxone. But doctors feel safer prescribing Suboxone then oxy codeine because it’s a different scheduled narcotic. But Suboxone is 10 times harder to get off of than oxy codeine, you won’t because of the long ship because of the long half life. And this isn’t this information isn’t out there because of the money because of NDB are the makers of Suboxone? These people have a lot of clout, and it’s just not Suboxone, who’s profiting you’ve got, I call them drill Mills, these poor pain patients, they’re being forced to undergo costly unnecessary steroid blocks trigger injections nerve ablations Dr. Feldman mentored me through this whole process is took me three months just to absorb everything that’s done in a doctor’s office with an injection. I get phone calls to advocate for people who are in the hospital howling in pain, because they don’t want to put in an order for pain medication.

John Malanca 41:54
 What do you do when you run that? Because I hear this all the time they go down there, try to refill the prescription. Sorry, Mrs. Jones, you have three more days before we can fill that. And so what do they do? Do they turn to street drugs? Because I’ve heard Yes,

Unknown Speaker 42:10
 yes. And that’s why that’s why prescribing is down by 43%. We have 50% less pills in our country. That’s because the DEA slashed manufacturing, it’s physically impossible to even overdose on pain pills. And that’s why harm reduction is so involved because they’ve interrupted the safe supply for an addict. And this won’t make a lot of sense to a lot of people. It didn’t at first to me, but an addict could get medication out of someone’s medicine cabinet. Now they hit the street, the pain pills, aren’t there. The data, hopefully, I mean, the data has lied all along. But now the data released by the CDC prescribing is down by 43%. pills. There’s 50% less being made in our country and overdoses continued to skyrocket and we ain’t seen nothing yet. 2021 is going to be probably one of the hardest years for overdoses. We’re seeing it. So the plan

John Malanca 43:17
 do to what?

Unknown Speaker 43:18
 The illicit fentanyl that’s killing people. That’s the real culprit. And since I’ve came since I’ve been on the show, john, in June 2020, the AMA put out a 17 page scathing letter to the CDC saying pull the guidelines, overdoses are skyrocketing. What have you done? You know you’ve got pharmacies because what 50 cut what our state what our country has done, they took the CDC guidelines and they turn them into regulation. And now the DEA is targeting doctors off of those CDC guidelines. You’ve got data analytics making decisions for you. So it’s very involved we know for sure, pain pills 2018 2019 2020 are not fueling the overdose in crisis, illicit fentanyl, heroin those are the those are the in drugs right now. It’ll probably a different it’s gonna be a different drug in 2021 and cannabis is being laced with a form of fentanyl. You know, drug dealers are creative. They know they don’t want their their consumer to die. You’ve got to keep them alive. So you can keep profiting. Yeah.

John Malanca 44:36
 This lawsuit that you guys are doing.

Unknown Speaker 44:39
 Who is it benefiting?

John Malanca 44:40
 Who’s profiting from it? What What’s your goal with this and how can we help?

Unknown Speaker 44:46
 Can I can I answer that Claudia works of course. And you know, somebody accused me I remember this this surgeon accused me one time I was always talking riddles. Okay, so I’m the I love history because history, whoever said it, those of us who don’t learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. Right? But you can learn some interesting things about this. So the pain patients, which number in the many, many millions, 10s of millions of chronic pain patients, you know, chronic back pain, big group cancer pain, big group sickle cell disease, not such a big group, but a but a sizable group, multiple sclerosis, trauma, lots of things, right. We have a big group. Now why are we getting treated this way? Well, that’s an interesting question. But we need a rallying cry. We need a rallying point, right. I’m here. You’re in Hawaii. Claudia.

John Malanca 45:47
 I was I was wishing I was at home. I’m in California, but okay. Well,

Unknown Speaker 45:50
 well, you know, but you’re, you’re far away from us. Yeah. So the rallying point in in the Spanish American War was remember the main you remember that from from from grade school, or junior high school. Remember the main It was a US warship in Havana harbor. It’s got sunk by the Spaniards. And then William Randolph first, you know, put that all over his newspapers. Remember the main and guess what? The Spanish American War started? Not too long after that. Well, this guy kolodny I have to give this guy credit. He says he’s a nefarious little man. And I saw this and in late 90s, that this was happening. I don’t know if I’m clairvoyant. But I’ve been around this rodeo. I actually called this guy up when he was working somewhere in New York. I said, Listen, I fought my whole career to legitimize the treatment of pain and you’re, you’re about to destroy it. And I basically said, you know, go screw yourself, but you need to pay attention to me. So kolodny is going to be plaintiff number one.

John Malanca 46:56
 And we’re sciatic, is he up in Rhode Island, Claudia? Well,

Unknown Speaker 46:58
 he’s, he’s up in he’s lives in New York, okay, but he got himself a fake professorship at a I’m sure ashamed to say a Jewish institution named Brandeis University, which was named after a Supreme Court Judge Louis Brandeis, which is heavily funded by Jews who understand or should understand what it’s like to, to experience prejudice to this day. But they but but remember, I said, Remember the follow the money. So So Brandeis has this thing called the Heller School, which I don’t know who endowed that. And, and, and I’ll try to keep it brief. But what they’ve done is when we were trying to treat more and more people compassionately, we asked, we begged for a database, meaning the doctors begged for a database. So we could see who were the real pain patients and who were the addiction patients. And the way we can see that is by pharmacy records, so we begged for what’s called a prescription database. Well, what happens to the prescription database? Again, people see opportunity where where we don’t we see opportunity to help people, and they see opportunity to make money. So the Hello school gets ahold of this database, and works with computer companies to use the data metrics to sell the metrics. You know, inflammation is money. So they sell your prescription or my prescription or anybody’s prescription, and God knows what happens to it. But let me tell you, what happens to it is pharmacies have to buy computer programs, the states have to buy computer programs, hospitals have to buy computer programs, and the DEA has access to these programs. So they look at this data. And you know, you remember the old bell shaped curve, right? If you’re two standard deviations out from the back on the right of the bell shaped curve, they target you for investigation, investigation means seizure of assets under civil asset seizure laws. And guess what they take a little biting hardworking, compassionate doctor and turn them into a criminal and put them in the federal prison. For 20 3040. I know of two doctors got life sentences for practicing medicine. And and, you know, El Chapo got a life sentence but many other people get suspension house arrest, public service, but they are out to ram this Suboxone so far up the American public’s, you know what, that they will never know what hit him. And it will take 100 years to undo this.

John Malanca 49:49
 You know, it’s sad and it sounds like a lot of the stuff that you’re talking about is is instilling fear not only in the doctors but in the patients.

Unknown Speaker 49:57
 Right.

John Malanca 49:58
 You know, and they can I feel that the, I guess, typical citizen feels that they’re handcuffed. They say, Well, this is these are the laws, this is what I have to do. What? And I know you have another call here, Claudia and I appreciate that I want to help. Be on be on the schedule here with you. What what what message can you share with our audience? what you like to do and what coming on my show and how we can help?

Unknown Speaker 50:28
 Well, you know, first and foremost, hang in there if you’re a pain patient, you know, just from this one hour show what Dr. Feldman just explained about the diet, and we have doctors who have they’ll never see the light of day those doctors are forgotten. We have to have a lawsuit filed in order to effect change. You know, the same way. The Department of Justice has made examples out of well intentioned physicians. We now have to make examples out of people like Andrew kolodny, who’s an unscrupulous psychiatrist who’s never put his hands on a patient and and Anna Lemke Yeah, these are horrible. These are ruthless individuals. And they’re all with this organization, prop PR o p. And then you have bigger organizations like shatterproof Gary Mendell, and these people are bringing in millions and millions of dollars, and they profit off your pain because they lost a loved one to an overdose. We in this lawsuit, this lawsuit will make an example out of these people for you know, exploiting grief stricken families and, and encouraging doctors to prescribe this highly addictive, deadly drugs Suboxone. And Andrew kolodny was quoted as saying I’d rather I don’t care how much views on the street, the more the better. And some doctors feel that way. Because it’s a great tool for addicts. We’re not addicts. I’m not going to be treated like an addict. I don’t beg for medication, nor will I ever, but the lawsuit against CVS. If the judge approves this class of people who have been discriminated against at the counter, you know, 510 years down the line that will change policy, this lawsuit against Andrew kolodny. Dr. Feldman has a GoFundMe because We can’t pay for the lawyers, the lawyers.

John Malanca 52:33
 That was an ask you Did you find a law firm pro bono is going to go after these?

Unknown Speaker 52:38
 Oh, no, no, no lawyers will not take this on a contingency basis. It’s far too expensive. lawyers will plow through a few million dollars. And Dr. Feldman has created the GoFundMe to help fund the lawsuit that’s necessary. Were not wealthy people. I think with litigation legislation, we can put a dent in this. And eventually one of our senators, maybe it’ll be my Senator, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Senator jack Reed. You know, I’ve got two Congress people, we only have two in Rhode Island. One is in a wheelchair, he was injured by a bullet. He takes pain medication to manage his pain. And then we have David sis aleni, who’s gay. And we have we advocate for people who have HIV, and they can’t get their pain medication. So you would think these people would, you know, speak on behalf. And I’ve said from the beginning, we really we need 10 senators to speak out. But when a senator tries like Bill Cassidy, he gets shut down. You know, they don’t want to hear it. All they hear is opioid crisis. And that’s the power of propaganda, so much propaganda. And, you know, when doctors say, Oh, well, opioids are never a good idea. And I said, well, opioids are never a good idea until you need them, then they’re a great idea. But where I’m where we’re, we remain vigilant in this fight to donate to the GoFundMe. You can do this by visiting Dr. Feldman is on social media, Facebook, to donate to the doctor patient form, all of your donations are tax deductible. That’s what’s going to help us me when I’m in DC with Dr. Feldman lobbying, knocking on senators doors, getting doors shut, you know, slammed in my face. So really, you

Unknown Speaker 54:33
 know,

Unknown Speaker 54:35
 yeah, literally, literally, well, that happens every day. Anyway, john,

Unknown Speaker 54:39
 well, john, they that what they’re able to do now is hide behind. Well, you’ll have to go on to our website and make an email appointment with our Scheduler. So, you know, they hide behind electronic wizardry. And I remember telling one of my senators Mississippi’s also a small state, and I used To be friendly with trent lott who was a very well respected senator in the south. And I remember telling him a long time ago, you know, Trent, I elected you, not your email. But that’s how it is. And so what I what we want to do, aside from this lawsuit, which we will do, God, you know, how do they say God willing, we will have a Washington presence 100% of the time. And, you know, do we do we like lobbying, not necessarily, but we have some serious issues that affect, you know, many, many millions of Americans from all walks of life, and we want those issues front and center. And that’s the only way it’s, I see that it’s going to happen, we don’t advocate, obviously, for violent revolution or burning down buildings. But you know, I can see the Million Man March, remember that for many, many years ago, I can see the million pain patient March. And that’s what I would like to see where people say, this is a a group of people that are deserving of consideration. That’s, that’s what I want to see. So, you know, I’ve been on this earth, you know, a number of decades, and I worked my whole life to try to make the treatment of pain legitimate, only to have it vaporize by a bunch of computer companies and pharmaceutical manufacturers. And that’s what we aim to change. But one other thing I want to tell your listeners, if you have a good doctor, if you have a concern doctor may try to make their life easy. And you know, a lot of this stuff is is nonsense, trying to put up with the nonsense. But, you know, be a compliant patient. So if any DEA agent comes to your doctor and says, Let me see the record for Mary Jones, Mary Jones should be a compliant patient, you know, within the confines of of Unfortunately, the Controlled Substances Act, which is now the Bible for doctors to follow for treating chronic pain patients never happened before. But that’s how it is today. So the other thing I’ll say is, you know, we like to advocate for people it’s kind of difficult sometimes because it’s kind of like potty and I and a couple other people. But you know, we’re anxious to help you hear your stories. Try to try to recommend for you things that can help you survive this. Really pain patients she calls it I call it a pain patient Holocaust. What do you call it? pain? patient? genocide, same thing,

Unknown Speaker 57:30
 same patient genocide.

Unknown Speaker 57:31
 Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 57:32
 It’s

John Malanca 57:34
 like I thank you both for doing what you’re doing. But also standing up for the patients that don’t have a voice standing here for the doctors that don’t have a voice. And some of these senators, you know, that I may be too afraid to speak out and speak, speak out and speak up. So, Claudia, always great to see a doctor Fellman I appreciate

Unknown Speaker 57:56
 Hey, thank you. I consider we’re now friends. Right back at you, sir.

John Malanca 58:02
 God bless you my Jewish Catholic friend.

Unknown Speaker 58:04
 Yes, sir. Hey,

John Malanca 58:07
 I’m going to throw a merry Christmas to you but happy

Unknown Speaker 58:10
 so much, sir. And

John Malanca 58:14
 we’ll get your lynching. So Claudia, if you can get me all the links for Dr. Feldman as well I put this on on the site as well as when this goes out. I’ll let you let you both know, of course and we’ll get it Okay.

Unknown Speaker 58:25
 All right, john. Thank you. Merry Christmas.

Unknown Speaker 58:27
 Thanks again.

John Malanca 58:28
 Very nice to meet you both and

Unknown Speaker 58:32
 find out