Six Questions: Siobhan Reynolds Talks to the Alliance
Drug Policy Alliance, "Six Questions: Siobhan Reynolds Talks to the Alliance." Drug Policy Alliance. February 27, 2004.

Siobhan Reynolds, Founding Executive Director of Pain Relief Network, came to her awareness of the undertreatment of pain the hard way. Having taken care of her chronically ill husband as they struggled to raise their son, Reynolds discovered the nightmarish reality facing patients in pain and their families. Unable to find ongoing and adequate pain care, and being subjected to relentless abuse and harsh treatment by medical professionals, Reynolds' personal journey to procure her husband's pain care and to save her family from ruination, evolved into a mission to end law enforcement's tyranny over pain treatment in America.

She lives in New York City with her now ex-husband and their twelve year old son.

1. How did you get involved in drug-policy reform?

My ex-husband developed serious chronic pain and I discovered that it is nearly impossible to get ongoing and adequate analgesia in the United States. At first I became a patient advocate and then later an advocate for pain physicians, when I saw that the U.S. Government was prosecuting them as drug dealers for treating pain appropriately.

2. What is your current role in the field?

I am the Founding Executive Director of Pain Relief Network. We are empowering patients to become politically active on their own behalf. We are also active in the legal defense of pain care. We represent an enormous constituency that crosses all traditional political lines. Pain knows no bounds.

3. What is your most memorable drug war moment?

I had just witnessed the conviction of three innocent doctors on Federal criminal charges that could send them to jail for the rest of their lives. One of the doctors' wives suffered a psychotic break from the unbelievable stress and was unable to sense the floor under her feet. She stepped around strangely, "looking" for the floor with her right foot. I turned and looked at one of the DEA agents who had prosecuted her elderly husband and saw him point her out to another agent and laugh.

4. What challenge would you most like to see the drug-policy reform movement overcome this year?

I'd like to see drug policy recognize the undertreatment of pain as a pivotal issue.

5. One sentence, please, that sums up your views on drug-policy reform.

Since the Drug War has destroyed the integrity of the doctor-patient relationship, turning doctors into drug police, drug policy reform would do well to take another look at the entire matter with this problem as its focal point, since this is where the Drug War has hurt most Americans.

6. What is your advice to fellow reformers who want to be more active in the field?

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