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Big Prescribers Arrested, Blackballed

Leon County Judge John Cooper on June 30, 2022, in a screen grab from The Florida Channel.
Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office
/
The Florida Channel
Leon County Judge John Cooper on June 30, 2022, in a screen grab from The Florida Channel.

A Delray Beach doctor who signed a lease saying he wouldn’t be opening a pain clinic appears to be running a pain clinic anyway, the Palm Beach Post reports. Dr. Fernando Jimenez has been arrested after nearby businesses tipped off authorities that patients were looking for him to write prescriptions for powerful pain pills. 

In a separate case,  Dr. Joseph Francis Piazza was arrested amid accusations he inappropriately prescribed thousands of pain pills at a clinic in Margate, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports.

Meanwhile, CVS has told its pharmacists to stop filling prescriptions on dozens of doctors who prescribe suspiciously large amounts of painkillers, the Orlando Sentinel reports. This company-wide focus on over-prescribing comes two years after CVS banned nearly two dozen Central Florida doctors who were prescribing painkillers at an “extreme” rate. 

Originally founded in December 2006 as an independent grassroots publication dedicated to coverage of health issues in Florida, Health News Florida was acquired by WUSF Public Media in September 2012.