Beset by lawsuits and criticism in U.S., opioid makers eye new market in India

Indians once thought of pain relief as an indulgence of the West, Dureja said after the woman left his office gripping her new prescriptions. The old way of thinking was, “Nobody has time to complain about pain in our country. But I’m getting five to seven new patients per day.”

Storefront for-profit pain clinics like Delhi Pain Management Centre are opening by the score across Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore and other cities in this teeming nation. After decades of stringent narcotics laws, borne of debilitating opium epidemics of centuries past, India is a country ready to salve its pain.

And American pharmaceutical companies — architects of the opioid crisis in the United States and avid hunters of new markets — stand at the ready to feed and fuel that demand.