Two in five Brits can't work without painkillers

GlobalPost

About two in five people in the UK take painkillers just to get to work, a new report says.

A healthcare charity, Nuffield Health, said that 37 percent of working Britons use painkillers like aspirin or stronger drugs, hinting at bigger dependency problems.

That's about 7.5 million people.

The study surveyed 3,100 people about their use of painkillers, said the Telegraph.

About half of those people said they had used the drugs last year.

Another quarter said they took between five and ten painkillers per day.

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One in three said they were taking drugs as strong as codeine, while seven percent said they were taking even stronger opiates, reported Wales Online.

"I was surprised at the overall extent of painkiller usage in the UK. It emphasizes that this whole problem has got out of control," said Manoj Krishna, a consultant spinal surgeon at the Nuffield Health Tees Hospital, reported Healthcare Today.

"But work can be painful: for instance back pain is aggravated by sitting. If you have it, you need painkillers to get through the working day."

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