The commercial market for abuse-deterrent opioids was thought to have blockbuster potential eight years ago, when drug makers started investing heavily in the therapeutic space on the heels of FDA's approval of an abuse-deterrent formulation of Purdue Pharma LP's big seller OxycontinXR (oxycodone). Flash forward to 2018 and the millions of dollars invested in the development of abuse-deterrent opioids appears to have gone up in smoke.
Back in 2010, pharma did not foresee the road blocks ahead, banking on the assumption that in the face of...