Overlooked Player in Opioid Epidemic: The 'Middlemen' (Newser Deep Dive)

A taste of the week's best longform stories.                          -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

December 21, 2024     Overlooked Player in Opioid Epidemic: The 'Middlemen' When making a list of the main culprits in the nation's opioid epidemic, drugmakers and greedy doctors quickly come to mind. But a New York Times investigation looks at another group whose crucial efforts "have largely escaped notice"—pharmacy benefit managers. Keep reading   The Assads Are Done. So Where Is the Money? The World Bank estimates that an astonishing 70% of Syrians lived in poverty in 2022 as residents coped with a long-running civil war. By contrast, the ruling Assad family had managed to swash away as much as $12 billion, much of it acquired illicitly, according to a State Department estimate that same year. Keep reading   From our sponsors This Breakthrough Heated Vest Is Taking the Internet by Storm—Keep Cozy and Comfortable All Winter Long! Genius rechargeable self-heating vest keeps you warm even in -20° weather. KEEP READING   Appalachia's Bitter Irony: Rehab Is Big Business A story in the New York Times Magazine presents an odd fact, one born of the opioid epidemic that has ravaged Appalachia: "Eastern Kentucky is one of the places where you're most likely to die of a drug addiction but also the place where you're most likely to receive treatment for it," writes Oliver Whang. Drug addiction is everywhere, he explains, and drug rehab has consequently become big business. Keep reading   Blinded by Headlights' Glare? You're Not Alone Anyone who drives at night has likely been momentarily dazed by the glare of an oncoming vehicle's headlights. There is, not surprisingly, a robust Reddit forum called "f---yourheadlights" dedicated to the issue, populated with driver's-view images. Keep reading   Inside a 'Mysterious, Scandalous Art Heist' "I think this is the most scandalous, mysterious art heist in Canada in the twenty-first century," declares former FBI agent Robert K. Wittman, a specialist in such thefts. He was speaking to Brett Popplewell of the Walrus, who unpacks the unusual heist in question: In late 2021 or early 2022, somebody took a priceless photo of Winston Churchill off the wall at the Fairmont Chateau Laurier hotel in Ottawa and replaced it with a cheap forgery. Keep reading     She Was 15, He Was 17. Theirs Isn't a Love Story When the fentanyl crisis began, most of its victims were adults. But as ProPublica reports, the rate of overdose deaths among teens has been surging since the pandemic. Keep reading   How a Shadowy Online Group Pushed a Man to Kill Himself Samuel Hervey was a 25-year-old having a mental health crisis while stranded in Kyrgyzstan during the pandemic in 2021. "Fmlk" was a troubled 15-year-old Eastern European teenager who'd gotten involved with a dark online community. Keep reading   From the Archives Hungry Deer Pose Threat to World's Biggest Organism It looks for all the world like a giant grove of trees, but this one has a twist: The 106-acre stand of aspens in Utah known as Pando is actually a single organism—and the biggest organism in the world at that. The trees don't grow from seeds but from shoots connected to the same root system. Keep reading   From Our Sponsors Manage your subscriptions  |  Unsubscribe from Newser emails  |  Privacy Policy We'd love to hear from you. Send us a note at feedback@newser.com. Read our stories on MSN. Newser, LLC  |  1395 Brickell Avenue  |  Suite 800  |  Miami, Florida  |  33131 © 2024 Newser, LLC. All rights reserved