Sociologists had tried for years to tell politicians that drug abuse was a symptom, not a cause. The kind of drug was irrelevant. Yes, heroin and fentanyl were deadlier than meth, and meth might be deadlier than alcohol. Alcohol might be more immediately dangerous than obesity, lousy dental care, poverty and low wages, crummy housing, depression, trauma, and anxiety. They were all part of the same pathology, though, and arguing about which was worse obscured the underlying causes of the abuse.
