Big Story Podcast – Dead End

Big Story Podcast

First responders are battling a drug epidemic with no end in sight.

Portland, Oregon, is an epicenter of the deepening opioid crisis in the United States, where a life is lost to drug use every eleven minutes. Fentanyl, a cheap and highly potent synthetic opioid up to fifty times stronger than heroin, has been responsible for the majority of overdose deaths. In 2023, the overdose death rate topped 112,000 in twelve months for the first time, with more lives lost than in the wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan combined. ‘Dead End’ brings into focus the personal stories of the people battling addiction in the streets of Portland.