Opinion: Doctors helping to solve opioid crisis they helped to create

Overuse of opioids is an ongoing crisis. Nearly 500 Albertans died from accidental opioid poisoning in the first nine months of 2017. Three-quarters of those deaths involved illicit fentanyl, which is commonly laced into other drugs. We have two inter-related problems: overuse of opioids and other drugs, and an illicit drug supply that is toxic in a way we’ve never seen before.
Over-prescribing of opioid painkillers contributed to the crisis, in part because physicians were told to treat p