Overview: This program traces the causes behind the unprecedented growth in the use of prescription opioids and the devastating impact these drugs are having in virtually every part of America.

DVD Verdict: Capturing the story of the opioid crisis through personal stories and interviews with experts, it reveals the tragic impact of the overuse of prescription painkillers on individuals, families, and communities.

Watching this documentary, if you haven't learnt something devastingly horrible about opioid's and their rampant designs on all our lives within the first few minutes, than you're simply not listening!

The opioid epidemic or opioid crisis is the rapid increase in the use of prescription and non-prescription opioid drugs in the United States and Canada beginning in the late 1990s and continuing throughout the first two decades of the 2000s.

Opioids are a diverse class of moderately strong painkillers, including oxycodone (commonly sold under the trade names OxyContin and Percocet), hydrocodone (Vicodin), and a very strong painkiller, fentanyl, which is synthesized to resemble other opiates such as opium-derived morphine and heroin.

The potency and availability of these substances, despite their high risk of addiction and overdose, have made them popular both as formal medical treatments and as recreational drugs.

Due to their sedative effects on the part of the brain which regulates breathing, opioids in high doses present the potential for respiratory depression, and may cause respiratory failure and death.

As we discover, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, "overdose deaths, particularly from prescription drugs and heroin, have reached epidemic levels."

That means that nearly half of all opioid overdose deaths in 2016 involved prescription opioids. From 1999 to 2008, overdose death rates, sales, and substance abuse treatment admissions related to opioid pain relievers all increased substantially.

By 2015, annual overdose deaths from heroin alone surpassed deaths from both car accidents and guns, with other opioid overdose deaths also on the rise.

The stories told here in 'Understanding the Opioid Epidemic' often begin with medical treatment for moderate to severe pain that evolve into drug addiction and death.

In addition to the stories, the documentary explores the dramatic increase in the use and acceptance of prescription painkillers and addresses possible solutions to the opioid epidemic including more non-drug treatment for pain, improved opioid prescribing, and reducing the amount of opioids produced and prescribed in America. This is, without a shadow of a doubt, must-see viewing. This is a Widescreen Presentation (1.78:1) enhanced for 16x9 TVs.