The opioid crisis doesn’t get the headlines it once did, but in no way should that fact be interpreted as suggesting it’s gone away.  By all accounts it remains stubbornly destructive and shocking in its impacts.  We’ve moved it out of the doctor’s office and pharmacists hands into the laps of the cartels which have replaced plant-based opioids with fentanyl and methamphetamine, which are cheaper synthetics.  Its path of destruction in America, once a disease of despair in rural enclaves, is now everywhere.  It’s cheap, plentiful and available year round.  We wanted to see how this scourge was trending and so we turned to Sam Quinones, the reporter whose books on the subject, “Dreamland” and “The Least of Us” have been the most praised of the many written.  His proximity to the subject and great expertise, along with a large dollop of humanity that permeates his writing, makes him according to the New York Times Book Review our leading chronicleer of the pain epidemic.