Opioid use is one of the most substantial and long-lasting public health crises faced by the United States. This crisis, which began by the mid-1990s and continues through the time of writing, causes 136 fatal opioid overdoses each day and costs the U.S. at least $596 billion each year. These...

We examine how deaths and emergency department (ED) visits related to use of opioid analgesics (opioids) and other drugs vary with macroeconomic conditions. As the county unemployment rate increases by one percentage point, the opioid death rate per 100,000 rises by 0.19 (3.6%) and the opioid...

The United States has experienced an unprecedented crisis related to the misuse of and addiction to opioids. As of 2018, 128 Americans die each day of an opioid overdose, and total economic costs associated with opioid misuse are estimated to be more than $500 billion annually. The crisis has...