Today the subcommittee holds a hearing entitled combatting the opoid crisis, battles in the states. Make no mistake, the term combatting and battles are entirely appropriate. Our nation is in the midst of a tremendous fight against death affecting every corner of our nation. There were more than 52,000 deaths in overdose. A 20 increase in the prior year. It was almost seven time it is rate of death from the heroin epidemic of the 1970s. We learned we have lost roughly 60,0 0 people to Drug Overdoses. That is more in one year than all the names on the vietnam veteran memorial wall. That is likely underestimated because much of the data will not be in until the end of next year. For every fatale overdose there is 20 nonfatale overdoses and for 2016 that could be near one million. More than 130,000 lives have been lost between 1999 and 2015. Thats about 50,000 oh 500,000 will be lost over the next decade. The roots began in 1980 when a letter was misinterpreted as evidence it was unlikely