Hello I'm Joan and this book is called Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe and it is extraordinary. It's the true story of the Sackler family who are known in many international circles for their philanthropy. They've given a lot of money to some really great causes across many countries and continents. But that money came from a very dark place. The Sackler family were the owners of Purdue Pharma which was the maker of OxyContin which went on to cause untold grief in the American and more widely abroad community. Something like 400,000 people have died from opioid addiction in the last 20 years. And the Sackler family were told many many times that their drug was causing so much misery. But they insisted on being oblivious to it. And in fact when it looked as if their revenues were starting to dry up in America they went looking for new markets to make sure that the billions kept flowing in. This is an extraordinary piece of investigative journalism and it's really important to read it and understand exactly how things got to the point that they did. I haven't lost anybody through OxyContin or opioid addiction but if I had, I would be full of rage. I was enraged just reading about them.
