An opioid is a type of narcotic drug that acts as a depressant towards someones central nervous system , some prescribed opioids are painkillers such as Morphine, Codeine, Hydrocodone, and Oxycodone. “We found that the rate of opioid overdose deaths in the United States grew, on average, by 8 percent per year from 1999 through 2013 and by 71 percent per year from 2013 through 2017, Yet, from 2003 through 2013 D.E.A. was authorizing manufacturers to produce substantially larger amounts of opioids.” some medication that has had an increase in production has been oxycodone which has had evidence of being over abused by patients and over prescribed by doctors to the patients which causes the patients to become dependent on the drug. Between 26 and 36 million people worldwide abuse opiates. “D.E.A. is responsible for regulating opioid production quotas and investigating its illegal diversion,” Michael E. Horowitz, the inspector general, said in a video on Tuesday. “We found that D.E.A. was slow to respond to this growing public health crisis and that its regulatory and enforcement efforts could have been more effective.”
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-are-opiates-2795406
