How COVID-19 is Fueling the Opioid Crisis in Ohio

WASHINGTON, D.C. — While Congress has been consumed with negotiating the latest COVID-19 relief package, a hearing Thursday connected the dots between the pandemic and the unintended impact it’s having on the opioid epidemic.

For the first time, lawmakers heard testimony from members of the Sackler family, who ran Purdue Pharma for decades and were behind the mass production of opioids like OxyContin.

“They placed their insatiable thirst for personal wealth over the lives of millions of American families they destroyed,” Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-New York) said at the hearing