BY RAYMOND BARGLOW
DRUG OVERDOSE IS NOW THE LEADING CAUSE OF death for Americans under the age of 50 and has lowered the average life expectancy in the United States.1 Over the next decade as many as half-a-million people in the United States will die from opioid substances that include heroin, pain-killers such as morphine and oxycodone, and synthetic agents such as fentanyl.2
Public policy to date has failed to counter this epidemic. Standing in the way of effective response are three mistaken approaches to the problem: