By Lenny Bernstein and Scott Higham October 22
UNNATURAL CAUSES SICK AND DYING IN SMALL-TOWN AMERICA: Since the turn of this century, rates have risen for whites in midlife, particularly women. In this series, The Washington Post is exploring this trend and the forces driving it. Related: Wholesalers sent pills to drugstores that fueled the opioid epidemic
A decade ago, the Drug Enforcement Administration launched an aggressive campaign to curb a rising opioid epidemic that was claiming thousands of American lives each year. The DEA began to target wholesale companies that distributed hundreds of millions of highly addictive pills to the corrupt pharmacies and pill mills that illegally sold the drugs for street use.
