The Social and Community Consequences of the Opioid Epidemic

Abstract

We provide a brief orientation to the articles that comprise this volume, which is an effort to understand the consequences of the opioid epidemic in a variety of societal and community domains. These domains include child welfare, living arrangements, education, food insecurity, housing, and public budgets, and they are often paid scant attention compared to research that focuses on the direct effects of opioid use. We give an overview of the articles that comprise this volume and discuss the ways in which they contribute new empirical insights on the consequences of the opioid crisis in the U.S. and Canada. We conclude with thoughts on the challenges inherent in this work, insights about how this volume of research might help us understand the broader reach of the epidemic, and how it helps in the development of prosocial public policies.