DOI: 10.5061/dryad.x3ffbg7tb
title: Data from: Dynamics of combatting market-driven epidemics: Insights from U.S. reduction of cigarette, sugar, and prescription opioid consumption

description: Misuse and overconsumption of certain consumer products have become major
 global risk factors for premature deaths, with their total costs in
 trillions of dollars. Progress in reducing such deaths has been slow and
 difficult. To address this challenge, this review introduces the
 definition of market-driven epidemics (MDEs), which arise when companies
 aggressively market products with proven harms, deny these harms, and
 resist mitigation efforts. MDEs are a specific within the broader
 landscape of commercial determinants of health. We selected three
 illustrative MDE products reflecting different consumer experiences:
 cigarettes (nicotine delivery product), sugar (food product), and
 prescription opioids (medical product). Each met the MDE case definition
 with proven adverse health impacts, well-documented histories,
 longitudinal product consumption and health impact data, and sustained
 reduction in product consumption. Based on these epidemics, we describe
 five MDE phases: market expansion, evidence of harm, corporate resistance,
 mitigation, and market adaptation. From the peak of consumption to the
 most recent data, U.S. cigarette sales fell by 82%, sugar consumption by
 15%, and prescription opioid prescriptions by 62%. For each, the
 consumption tipping point occurred when compelling evidence of harm,
 professional alarm, and an authoritative public health voice and/or public
 mobilization overcame corporate marketing and resistance efforts. The gap
 between suspicion of harm and the consumption tipping point ranged from
 one to five decades–much of which was attributable to the time required to
 generate sufficient evidence of harm. Market adaptation to the reduced
 consumption of target products had both negative and positive impacts. To
 our knowledge, this is the first comparative analysis of three successful
 efforts to change the product consumption patterns and the associated
 adverse health impacts of these products. The MDE epidemiological approach
 of shortening the latent time to effective mitigation provides a new
 method to reduce the impacts of harmful products.
description: # Data from: Dynamics of combatting market-driven epidemics: Insights from
 U.S. reduction of cigarette, sugar, and prescription opioid consumption
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.x3ffbg7tb](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.x3ffbg7tb) This data shows the amount of opioids that were prescribed in the United States over the three decades that were most affected by the opioid epidemic.  The data was accessed with permission from Michael Kleinrock, senior research director at the IQVIA Institute. ## Description of the data and file structure The data is measured in billions of Morphine milligram equivalents (MMEs), which is the standard unit for opioids used by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to measure potency. For example, in 1992, the data cell reads 27.288. This means that 27.288 billion Morphine Milligram Equivalents (MMEs) were dispensed to the US population in 1992. The data is provided on a yearly basis. No cells are missing data in the time frame (1992-2022). ## Sharing/Access information This data is part of Figure 3 in an open access PloS Global Public Health paper titled "Dynamics of combatting market-driven epidemics: Insights from U.S. reduction of cigarette, sugar, and prescription opioid consumption." * [https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgph.0003479](http://...)