Across the nation, communities are suffering from rampant opioid misuse and overdose rates, and the 420 counties in the Appalachian region of the eastern U.S. have been disproportionately impacted by this epidemic of addiction. At the turn of the millennium, the opioid overdose death rate for Appalachian counties was roughly equal to that of the rest of the country. By 2017, however, the death rate for opioid overdoses in Appalachian counties was 72 percent higher than that of non-Appalachian...
