The History of Drugs in Society explores the history of different substances and how we’ve lived alongside and interacted with them. This season, we’re going to look at opium in one of three ways: opium as a medicine, opium as a commodity that is traded, and opium as a drug that is consumed and people become addicted to. Each episode will have one of these three as the primary focus. We will start with the first signs of the opium poppy through the current opioid crisis in America and the major issues surrounding opioids globally.