What doctor in his right mind would prescribe SOOO many downers to one person? Am i naive, or does it sound like a lot to have all 6 of those things at once? Maybe if he had had a bit of coke, he'd still be with us.

I-heart-Rien

It's tragic no matter how it happened, but an accident - especially sounding as it does like he just wanted to get some sleep - is just heart-breaking.

Sweet Panda Love

Needless. Sad. But this kind of mix & match abuse of prescription drugs is so prevalent in our hopped-up Rx nation.

Are doctors asking the right questions of their patients? Giving them stern advice?

Or is it just a big Halloween-candy grab-bag?

mothrafairy

And a collective sigh of relief comes from all concerned. (perhaps it's loudest at Warner Bros.) Despite british tabloids showing us the Chateau Marmont video (Newsoftheworld.com) That showed he was clearly a bit high, it's reassuring (and perhaps even more sad) that it was an innocent fuck up. Poor Heath. R.I.P.

mr_wednesday

Too bad. People seriously need to understand their own systems better.

@blackheartededitor: Doesn't mean it wasn't an accident.

SuperUnison

So sad. And it's happening all over America, and not just to young people. Take a look in the medicine cabinet of anyone over the age of 70, and you'll see a very nice display of drugs (oops, I mean medication).

TryThisAtHome

I'm waiting for the CO$ to claim that psychiatrists killed Heath Ledger.

NotReadyForPrimeTime

Oxycontin & Vicodin? Plus sleeping pills? Plus a rolled-up $20? That guy was getting high, don't fool yourselves.

blackheartededitor

You don't have to have a PHD in psychopharmacology to know taking all those drugs together is a BAD idea.

Maybe not an intentionally suicide, but if you're mixing all those drugs, you've got a death wish.

Lula Mae Broadway

You're assuming he had prescriptions for all of them.

brilliantmistake

@anagramsam: Heath Ledger = Health Greed

SteamyMcFirecrotch

I dunno...I think it's tragic as well (sure fits the definition) but he's not some wet-nosed kid. He knew what each of those is capable of on its own. I kinda think he was depressed and popped a few extra to stop feeling so bad, not to get some shut eye. He did have an appointment coming up soon with a massage therapist, remember? Tragic, but intentional.

Shumina

@SteamyMcFirecrotch:

That's a good point. Doctors from a myriad of sources can't know what their confreres are prescribing. But the prescription notion of "controlled substance" is becoming a total contradiction.

It would seem that one solution is that any given prescribing doctor might tell a patient (even a famous one): "Look, I'm prescribing you this drug and don't you dare mix it with this, this, this and this."

I can truly imagine the poor man being so "out of it" from insomnia that he simply popped everything on hand, just to get some shut-eye. Bless his heart.

mothrafairy

heath ledger = he held great

anagramsam

I believe he got some of the meds in Australia, some in Europe and some in the US, so the doctors would not necessarily be communicating or know that he had other meds he was taking unless he disclosed this to them.

I had a friend who bought this stuff right off the internet!

So... yes indeed tragic, all the more so because a professional was not able to control what he was taking.

SteamyMcFirecrotch

@I-heart-Rien: Does seem a bit weird, doesn't it? Especially as one doc after the fact was saying that most have a high tolerance, and the odd extra pill wouldn't kill you - it would have to be a massive dose.

mr_wednesday

@Scooter34: Ah, that makes sense. I was only going by the above, which only says that they were prescription, not that he had personal prescriptions for all of them.

brilliantmistake

"The City of New York" what a rather frivolous font for such a serious document, of course I guess that it is used on all NYC stationary.

I'm Waitin' for Dolemite

@brilliantmistake: No, we're not assuming that he had prescriptions for all of them. We're relying on the police report, which states that he had prescriptions for all of them - three from Europe, three from America, no comment on which doctors prescribed which.

Scooter34

Amen, Lula Mae. Seems like the practice of medicine has become just another form of sales for a lot of doctors. How many of those M.D.s who wrote scrips for Heath actually made eye contact with him? What happened to the Hippocratic oath?

academyscreamer

Me thinks there's alittle more to it than 'he needed some sleep...'

Miss d

Kinda weird that Ledger died the same way the "Joker Brand" products worked in the first Batman, by a mixture of the wrong ingredients, not an overdose of one.

Rickish

dude just wanted a buzz, he made a mistake, its unfortunate but hey ish happens.

shadymilkman

I don't think this was recreational. Sometimes people get anxious and mix drugs. Mixing Unisom with other things is what did him in. The active ingredient in Unisom is the same as in Benadryl and I had a scary experience with this once. I take a medication for seizures and one day I had an allergic reaction and decided to take some Benadryl. The morning after I could barely move and I was so sedated. I took a normal dose of both medications. It was terrifying. I tried to move and I just couldn't. Certain drug interactions are just deadly and a lot of these accidents happen when u insert an OTC drug into the mix. It was def accidental. Some drugs work in a way that they raise the levels of other drugs in your blood and inhibit their metabolism, therefore causing ODs.

crimsonbarbie