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The Essential: The Inquiry: What's Killing White American Women?

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The Inquiry: What's Killing White American Women?

11/05/2016 GMT

BBC World Service - The Essential, The Inquiry: What's Killing White American Women?

Addiction expert Dr Andrew Kolodny on the US's prescription painkiller epidemic

Addiction expert Dr Andrew Kolodny on the US's prescription painkiller epidemic.

Advances in everything from medicine to nutrition to economic growth mean death rates have been falling around the world for years. But for less educated white American women, that trend has reversed. One reason is a rise in drug overdoses. In this excerpt from The Inquiry, Dr Andrew Kolodny of Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing explains how a slick 1990s marketing campaign led to the US's worst ever drug addiction epidemic.

(Photo: Prescription Oxycodone pain pills lie on display. Credit: Getty Images)

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