There is a growing black market for legal drugs, commonly bought with deadly results.

Nationwide, there are nearly 7 million Americans abusing prescription drugs, an 80% increase from a decade ago, more than the combined numbers of those abusing cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, ecstasy and inhalants, according to the US Health Department.

With a growing number of overdose deaths from taking illegal prescription drugs, there is growing concern amongst the authorities as to who is selling these drugs, and frustrated they are complaining about a lack of resources to stop the trade.

The problem is particularly bad in southern Ohio, where high poverty makes the drug trade look pretty lucrative.

According to a report in The Columbus Dispatch, Scioto County, with its eight pill manufacturing operations features amongst the ten most significant places in the country, including on the U. S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s watch list for illegal prescriptions for painkillers and other narcotics trafficking.

According to the latest available data, prescription overdose drug related deaths have risen 280% in the past decade, with 524 deaths in 2008, the latest data available.

Barbara Howard, member of a Portsmouth’s local drug task force, whose daughter died from an overdose in 2009, said in order to stop this, pain clinics need to be regulated and doctors stopped from handing out drugs to those who don’t need them.

However, law enforcers statewide say they don not have sufficient funds or legal authority to prevent rogue doctors writing prescriptions and shady pharmacists filling them.

As well, a lobbying group that goes by the name of The Buckeye State Sheriffs’ Association, many doctors and dentists are going ahead and prescribing painkillers, without first checking the prescription drug database.

In 2006, Ohio created a statewide database, which allowed physicians to check the prescription histories of patients, in an attempt to discourage addicts from ‘doctor shopping’ to get drugs. However, from amongst Ohio’s 42,000 licensed doctors and dentists, only 5,500 have registered to use the voluntary online database.

There are calls for a state law requiring doctors and dentists to check the database, including providing the authorities teeth for going after medical professionals abusing the system, however, without preventing doctors’ from treating patients with real chronic pain issues.