Thanks. It would, indeed, be interesting to turn this data into scatter plots and look for correlations. Aside from simple laziness, I didn’t proceed further because I think I need some hidden variables to explain the regional distributions of heroin and fentanyl overdoses, neither of which look like they can be fully explained by the opiate prescription map.
The hidden variables may be specific distribution networks for the two separate drugs. But I don’t know any good way to measure the regional availability of illegal drugs, to plot that against the overdose rates.
Worldwide, most heroin is from Afghanistan, but most of the heroin in the US is from Mexico or south America: https://www.therecoveryvillage.com/heroin-addiction/where-does-heroin-come-from/#gref
So that sounds like typical cartel activity. I believe that most of the fentanyl is coming from China, but I’m not really sure what’s going on there — is it cartels hiring out cheap manufacturing? Or is someone in China exploiting the US crisis for profit? Or is it dealers directly connecting with foreign suppliers via silk road style websites? Either way, I suspect the drugs end up concentrated in different locations.
Much like your gun+criminal stoichiometry analogy, you need both an opiate addict and a poorly labelled, excessively potent drug to cause an overdose. Many states are likely not saturated with available fentanyl, so, unlike guns, the local availability of drugs does matter.
For conservatives, this likely implies that we should just fight the drug war harder. Of course, trying to crack down on the supply of drugs rarely has the intended effect.
