The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's new opioid initiative has started; it aims to crack down on pharmacies and prescribers.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions said for the next six weeks, DEA investigators will focus on patterns where "unusual or disproportionate" amounts of opioids are dispensed. That includes looking at data from millions of reports the agency collects annually from prescription-drug makers. Field agents will target the suspects to, as Sessions claims, increase arrests and cut opioid availability.
According to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were more than 63,000 U.S. drug overdose deaths in 2016 alone.
