(The Conversation) – Australia currently finds itself in the unusual position of being both in an opioid epidemic and experiencing a shortage of these critical medicines. The Therapeutic Goods Administration has placed eight oral morphine products on its shortage list. It doesn’t expect supply for these products to be resolved until around October or November this year. This is a problem for the near 100,000 people receiving palliative care who may rely on opioids, such as morphine, to manage their daily chronic pain.

So why are we short and what are clinicians and patients doing instead? (Read More)