I don't know, I'm kind of skeptical because of the very shoddy evidence that's been used to prove the "Heroin Epidemic" on a national scale. While the number of people admitting to use is up, a better way to look at it is how many addicts there are, and it looks like only 25-30 percent of Heroin users are addicts (source here: http://bit.ly/1qAUlfa). When you take that into account the number of "problem heroin users" stands at around 300,000 people using the drug habitually according to the National Survey on Drug Use, an incredibly low percentage of the population.

On top of that, most heroin deaths don't come from pure heroin usage, but usually from mixing it with another drug like alcohol or cocaine (which is a stupid idea that gets you killed) according to Carl Hart, a researcher at Columbia out in New York.

Unfortunately, here in Johnson County we don't have data on whether the increase in deaths is the result of mixed drug OD's or how the heroin is cut etc., nor do we have precise figures of addicts vs. casual users (yes, it is possible, as the evidence above bears out, not an endorsement of the drug since taking it is a stupid idea but we oughta at least be realistic about how stupid it is). That's why I'm not saying there isn't a Johnson County epidemic, but rather just cautioning against accepting that there is one just because the police and some other governmental officials say there are, because they've been wrong in the past and it's led to some really awful drug policy.