What I find amusing, if predictable, are the headlines about HEROIN! But when you read the article or watch the special it turns out the real problem is prescription opiods. But I guess that’s just how you roll when Big Pharma is a major advertiser.
Well, cheap heroin is a big problem, at least regionally. What's amusing is that the politicians, always trying to look busy, are spending money to further regulate prescription pain medicine, using the (mostly false) idea that the CAUSE of explosive heroin addiction is bad prescribing of legal opioids.
I've been working in this field for forty years. What IS true is that heroin addicts will use pills if they can get 'em, and pill addicts will use heroin if the can't get their pills.
This has little to do with treatment of pain, except that it's an excuse for another government program and several thousand more government employees, plus many grant recipients who will show their gratitude on election day.