(Reuters) Kurt is a 32-year-old IT systems administrator from Des Moines, Iowa. He has a colleague who had been prescribed "ridiculous amounts" of Vicodin for a chronic back problem.
His colleague offered him some of the pills. Soon Kurt was taking them three to four times a week to get high and relax.
"I had been prescribed Vicodin before so I knew the effects," he said. "I would come home, take a couple and pour myself a drink, to help me unwind."
He is not alone. One in 10 Americans admit taking a prescription drug they have not been prescribed, and a quarter of those people have used them just to get high, according to an ongoing Reuters/Ipsos poll. (link.reuters.com/ban42v)
While about six in ten Americans who used another person's prescriptions did so for pain relief, a fifth took them to sleep or to manage stress and anxiety, the poll showed.
Kurt said his colleague would give him between thirty and forty pills at a time. Usually he would take the Vicodin while alone, but he occasionally shared the pills with friends during an evening out.
After eighteen months he finally kicked the habit. "I just felt like I was using too frequently," he said.
Prescription drug misuse has reached epidemic levels and it is now the second most abused category of drugs in the United States, after marijuana, according to a survey conducted for the U.S. government.
Pharmacies in the United States dispensed more than 4 billion prescriptions in 2012, according to IMS Health, a healthcare research firm.
The poll indicated it is not difficult to get hold of such drugs even without a prescription. About two thirds of those who used other people's prescribed drugs were given them by a family member, friend or acquaintance, the poll showed. Only about 14 percent were either taken without permission or purchased.
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