More Than 80% of the World’s Morphine Goes to North America, Europe

The majority of the world’s morphine—more than 80%—was distributed within North America and Europe in 2021, with high-income countries consuming 63 times as much of the drug as low-income countries. Documented disparities in access to morphine, whose uses include managing moderate to severe pain as well as treating severe breathlessness at the end of life, “must be a cause for concern,” according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report.