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#9– Heroin and prescription drug abuse on the rise
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Heroin and prescription drug abuse became the number-one problem for law enforcement in Western Pennsylvania in 2014, U.S. Attorney David J. Hickton said in September after he formed a task force to address the epidemic.
Drug-related overdoses have quadrupled in Pennsylvania, which has the seventh-highest number of them among U.S. states, he said.
Washington County had just two drug overdose deaths in 1992, as compared to 58 in 2013.
Lawmakers also in 2014 enacted a prescription drug monitoring program using software designed to expose those who “doctor shop” to obtain more opiates than necessary, and physicians and pharmacists who abuse the system for profits.