It took five years, but Pima County has closed the books on one of its most troubling health care issues.
County taxpayers will pay $1 million over the next five years to settle a 2004 case of missing narcotics at what then was called Kino Community Hospital.
More than 470,000 doses of painkillers with a street value of $1 million were missing from the hospital. Most were sold on the street.
Pima County already paid a $110,000 fine to the Arizona Board of Pharmacy and the director of hospital pharmacy no longer works for the county. The $1 million settlement will be used in an education campaign about the abuse of prescription drugs.
The hospital now is called University Physicians Healthcare Hospital at Kino Campus and is run by UPH. It’s good to put this problem in the rearview mirror.