“Empire of Pain” Author Draws Large Crowd to UAMS for Lecture

By Linda Satter

The 335-seat Fred W. Smith Auditorium was bursting at the seams April 26 as physicians, pain management experts and members of the community gathered to hear author Patrick Radden Keefe recount his investigative reporting into the origins of the opioid crisis in America.

A livestream of the presentation attracted nearly 100 viewers from such states as New York, Georgia, North Carolina, Minnesota, Illinois, Kansas, Washington, California, Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas as well as from Sweden, Mexico, France and Uruguay.

Author of the New York Times bestseller “Empire of Pain,” which examines the role that a prominent philanthropic family played in the crisis, Keefe said he stumbled onto the family’s hidden connections to the drug industry about a decade ago. At the time, he was writing articles for The New Yorker magazine about the business side of Mexican drug cartels and their various “product lines,” and noticed that the cartels had suddenly begun shipping more heroin to the United States.

“Empire of Pain” Author Draws Large Crowd to UAMS for Lecture

Johnathan Goree, M.D., left, who directs Interventional Pain Management Services at UAMS, and Rohit Dhall, M.D. , chair of the UAMS College of Medicine Department of Neurology, talk with Keefe while he signs copies of his books after the lecture. Image by Evan Lewis