“An Overview of Recent Findings – The United States continues to be in the grasp of an opioid epidemic. According to research done by the Rockefeller Institute of Government, drug death rates increased in almost every state between 2015 and 2016 — and those numbers continue to rise. The damage from opioid abuse is not limited to individual users, but has ripple effects that impact families, communities, and governments. Policymakers and activists are grappling with how to best address the problem, but are often stymied by budget constraints and a lack of evidence as to what actually works. Recent research, however, has found that legal access to marijuana may be a potential tool for addressing the opioid crisis…”