Gun fatalities are certainly not under-reported. Heroine fatalities almost certainly are. The problem is worse than stated.
I saw this coming forty years ago, as attitudes and morals crumbled with my generation coming of age. Clinton, Obama, and Rather are both symptoms and cause. The boomers have totally screwed up this country and left an irreparable mess for coming generations.
Much worse. The standard ER approach to a non-responsive is to search the mouth and all cracks and crevices for a fetanyl patch. Most of these DOAs have several drugs in their system. It has truly gotten rampant in the last eight to ten years.. it is picking up in numbers as drug use is normalized. Same thing happened in Puerto Rico and it declined, for whatever reasons.. The drug culture is strong and kids can earn more money selling drugs than getting a job that benefits society.
If you ever have to hold their hand and beg them to get their life straight, you will get it. It is a powerful problem that we have kept quiet about during the Obama years.
So I am torn.. circumstatially these girls are just trying to get by by trading their bodies for drugs.. The look in their eyes is surreal, like there is a light under the addiction.. a light that wants to leave it all behind. What they have done brings them back full circle and they are ashamed, hurt and then the craving starts. It feels better for a while.. terrible cycle.
On the other hand, there is the matter of choosing that life. It’s not so black and white in real life as it is on an ideological level.