The Escalating Opioid Epidemic in the United States
Exploring data about drug overdose from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Patrik Radden Keefe is one of the best non-fiction writers of all time, and the way he delivers a meticulously researched story is otherworldly.
Two years ago, I read his book Empire of Pain (4.55 on Goodreads!), and it blew my mind. The book describes how the Sackler family built a fortune selling painkillers and how that led to an opioid epidemic in the United States, killing tens of thousands yearly.
It’s a book filled with facts you can’t put down because it’s so well written.
So, when I found that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have a public dataset on drug overdoses in the United States, I just had to explore the numbers.
Let’s take a look.
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Is there an epidemic?
You may have heard about the opioid epidemic, but if you’re like me, you probably don’t know the details.
But since we don’t want to live in darkness and not understand the world around us, it’s high time to…
