Several years back, we published a two-part series called the opioid tragedy.

We interviewed physicians and

we all talked about how bad the opioid epidemic was back then.

About 70,000 individuals died from a drug overdose just in 2017.

That's more Americans than were ever killed by guns, car crashes, or HIV AIDS in a single year. We also discussed a variety of solutions, some of them

straight up medical solutions.

Opie use disorder is treatable. It's not a death sentence, it's a medical

condition and it's treatable

And we also talked about harm reduction. That's the idea that when it is not practical to outright prohibit something that's dangerous

It's worth finding a compromise in the case of a dangerous something that's dangerous like Buprenorphin. In a later episode, we discussed harm reduction with Raul Gupta,

director of national drug policy in the Biden administration.

This administration has been very clear for the first time in the history of the United States

federal government.

We have made harm reduction the central tenet of how we need to move forward.

Gupta told us about government-funded needle exchanges and the distribution of

Nyloxone, a drug that can rapidly reverse an opioid overdose.

There have been other developments in the fight against opioid overdose deaths, including

an intensive law enforcement campaign to cut down on drug trafficking.

Also, billions of dollars of settlement money has started to flow from the

opioid manufacturers, distributors, and consultants who did such a good job of selling their

products. So with all that money and all that law

enforcement and with harm reduction and medical treatments you might think we had the problem surrounded. You would certainly think that

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