Illicit use of heroin has been a major public health crisis in the United States for decades, and the more recent availability of other opioid-based substances has caused the number of heroin users to increase further. More than seventy thousand Americans died from drug overdoses in 2017, from both illicit drugs and prescription opioids—a two-fold increase in a decade (NIDA, 2020). An analysis on data retrieved from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) reported that from 2002 to 2013 the overall rate of heroin addiction increased from 1.0 per one thousand to 1.9 per one thousand, a 90 percent increase overall. They also found that annual average rates of past-year heroin use increased from 1.6 per one thousand from 2002 to 2004 to 2.6 per one thousand from 2011 to 2013 (Jones, Logan, Gladden, & Bohm, 2015).
About Me
Richard N. Engstrom, PhD, is associate director of applied research and outreach at the University of Maryland’s Institute for Governmental Service and Research. He has published research on the influence of generational change on public policies, election systems, and other factors related to political representation.
Yiming Chen, MS, is currently a second year PhD student in the biostatistics and bioinformatics program at the University of Maryland, College Park. Her research interests include data analysis, survival analysis, and clinical trial design. She has worked for the University of Maryland’s Institute for Governmental Service and Research as a graduate assistant for the past two years.