90% of Heroin Users Are White

Oh how times have changed. As heroin use jumped 80 percent from 2007 to 2012, its users changed as well. In a new study published in JAMA Psychiatry, roughly 90 percent of heroin users are white, and 75 percent now live in non-urban locations. The increase in usage is believed to be related to abusers of prescription pills turning to heroin because it’s now cheaper and more accessible. After prescription-pill abuse skyrocketed in the 1990s, companies made their drugs harder to manipulate, making heroin an easier alternative.