“Hillbilly heroin,” they called it – OxyContin, and other opioid prescription painkillers.
Police Chief Bill Hollingsed of Waynesville, in Western North Carolina’s Haywood County, recalls about four years ago when the county medical examiner shared with him a shocking statistic: Twenty-five percent of recent deaths investigated by that office were attributable to overdose of these drugs.
Hollingsed was aware opioid use was on the rise, but such a high rate of death – “It took even those of us in law enforcement by surprise,” he said.
