Addiction is largely mental. Once you get past the physical symptoms (which is typically the period of time which treatment focuses on), it is the mental issues (often similar issues that lead one to suicide) which cause a relapse. Just as intervening and getting someone help is important to treatment of drug addiction, intervening and getting someone help is important for depression and those at risk of suicide. 

But theres not really any overall point I was making there. Just saying they are both public health issues.

What I do want to know is what you mean by that last bit. How are we to expect improvement if we don't change? If our current systems clearly aren't working, is it reasonable to expect that the drug epidemic will vanish because of a law that's been on the books for years? Do you think that imprisonment is in any way more beneficial to these individuals than actual treatment?

EDIT: The more I read about the treatment methods we use in the USA, the more I'm not surprised how high the relapse rates are. To seriously tackle opioid addiction, we need to rework how we deal with it not just from a prison/rehab level but within how rehab is handled itself. 

https://www.thedailybeast.com/why-drug-rehab-is-outdated-expensive-and-deadly

What I meant by my last line was that the most effective and cheapest healthcare is not using any health services such as prevention measures ... 

Letting opioid consumption go unchecked will only further exasperate the issue much like our unparalleled obseity issues so going softer shouldn't even be an option, heck we shouldn't even have a system for this at all when opioid addiction is a largely preventable condition ...

There's precendent to show this when China during the Qing Dynasty lost the opium wars to Britain and opioid addiction ravaged these locales like there was no tomorrow. It wasn't until China experienced the second revolution when it became known as a people's republic that they started a massive crackdown on drug trafficking and the results speak for themselves since one of the top US officials praised their drug control procedures as effective in a country that's 3x bigger with it's citizens being comparatively 5x poorer but the biggest kicker of them all they solved this issue DECADES AGO in a nation that was troubled from opioids for generations! All drug dealer's get an instant death penalty so drug control obviously DOES WORK ... 

If those same people are going to advocate for gun control then those very same people should advocate strict drug control when the likes of China is a shining illustration of this by having the easiest of all the solution through banning illegal trade of opioids and handing out death penalties to those dealers. Another role model nation for this is Singapore where drug dealers get hanged! 

Just as you see a softer path there is also a hardline path that's PROVEN TO WORK and the US should start thinking about handing out out death penalties to drug dealers ... 

Okay, I wasn't really expecting that suggestion.

First of all, I would like to say that decriminalization almost always focuses on decriminalizing mere possession, not dealing (or "intent to deal" with possession of larger amounts of the illegal substance). I don't think anyone is suggesting that dealers get a free pass, just that focusing criminal resources on users instead of dealers is a waste of resources. The argument for decriminalization exists almost exclusively on the side of demand. If anything it frees up resources to work against the supply side.

Second, pretty much everyone in the international community believes execution for drug crimes in a huge human rights issue and even a violation of international law. 

Third, does it even really work? The consensus in the criminal justice field is that death penalty as a whole does little to deter crime. Then, you start looking at the countries where it is implemented:

Iran: Death penalty failing to deter drug trafficking - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-rights-executions/death-penalty-failing-to-deter-drug-trafficking-in-iran-official-idUSKCN1120A8

China: Drug use has been steeply rising for years, at greater rates than the USA. They estimate about 1.5million heroin users, which is roughly the same amount as in the USA. Despite their heavy crackdown on drugs, little effect has been seen in recent years.

Singapore and Malaysia: In a study examining drug prices (using supply/demand to estimate that if the death penalty was a deterrent, supply would decrease and cost would increase), they found prices to be lower and drug use to rise in Singapore and Malaysia compared to Indonesia who did not have the death penalty for drug offenses. Singapore is now slowly moving away from mandatory death penalties.

Finally, I'll leave you with this quote:

Many governments in Asia who impose the death penalty for drug crimes claim that they do so as a way to combat crime, since the harshness of the death penalty will deter those who may consider engaging in drug crimes. However, there has been no conclusive evidence presented to date to suggest that the death penalty has any deterrent effect against drug crimes. There is no statistical data proving that the death penalty has had a direct impact in reducing drug crimes. There are no studies that have been able to prove conclusively that the possible threat of death as punishment has been the reason why potential drug offenders or re-offenders have refrained from committing drug crimes. The fundamental assumption that the death penalty will deter criminals and reduce drug crime is therefore not supported by any existing reliable evidence. In fact, some data analyses show that there is no significant difference in the rate of drug crimes between States that execute people for drug crimes, and those that do not. In fact, it has been shown that, in some countries where the death penalty is abolished, drug crimes are even lower.

Secondly, the “deterrent effect” argument ignores the complexity of why many individuals engage in drug crimes, and that the threat or risk of punishment may not be the decisive factor when someone is considering whether or not to engage in a drug crime. Some individuals might consider that the potential benefit they may gain out of such a crime outweighs the risk of being punished. This is especially so for individuals in particularly vulnerable situations. For example, those who are economically marginalized constitute a large number of those who engage in low-level drug crimes. Their economic prospects are often so limited that engaging in drug crime presents a worthwhile risk, even if it carries the risk of the death penalty. Without analyzing the motivations and situations of those who are most often convicted of drug crimes, it is impossible to judge whether any given punishment, including the death penalty, will have a genuinely deterrent effect.

Thirdly, there is no proof to show that the death penalty is a more deterrent punishment against drug crime than other consequences such as imprisonment or rehabilitation.

https://www.fidh.org/IMG/pdf/asia_death_penalty_drug_crimes_fidh_wcadp_report_oct_2015_pdf.pdf

One More:

It is unquestionable that the narcotics trade in many countries (e.g., Saudi Arabia, Iran, China and Malaysia) is still increasing despite the introduction of mandatory death sentences for these crimes [13]. In Malaysia, although there had been more than 200 people executed since 1975, the 2004 report from INCB indicated that the availability of heroin in Malaysia had increased, due to the rising demand for the drug [13,23]. Amnesty International further points to the Malaysian Inspector General of Police’s report published in 1985, noting that the death penalty was considered to be an ineffective deterrent on narcotic traffickers, evidenced by the increasing number of drug traffickers entering the market [1]. Colman Lynch similarly notes that the death penalty is less likely to have a deterrent impact on illicit drug traffickers in Indonesia, since it is a crime providing high profits [10]. They also observe that when Indonesian law enforcement agencies focus more attention on one illicit drug over another, traffickers simply change their focus toward other types of drugs. As a result, Lynch suggests that the best way to address narcotic problems is to focus on it from the demand side rather than the sanction side [10].

http://www.mdpi.com/2075-471X/2/2/115 

Frankly, we wouldn't need to decriminalize possession of drugs if we could effectively control the external sources ...

"International law" is empty and the UN can't tell a sovereign nation what to do. Yes, enforcing death penalty for drug crimes does work according to UNODC's compiled data ... 

Nations such as China (0.25%), Vietnam (0.27%), Thailand (0.2%), Saudi Arabia (0.06%), Singapore (0.01%) and Indonesia (0.16%) have low opioid prevalence rates between the ages 15-64 ... 

For comparison nations that don't give death penalty for drug crimes and/or have more lax laws such as Costa Rica (2.8%), USA (5.9%!), Afghanistan (2.92%), Russia (1.64%), Ukraine (1.16%), Estonia (1.52%) and New Zealand (1.1%) have relatively high opioid prevalence across age ranges 15-64 ... 

The only reason why death penalty doesn't work in Iran is when their neighbors from Afghanistan are constantly smuggling drugs inside that territory. If Afghanistan ever enforces death penalty for drug dealers then prevalence of opioid usage will also drop ... 

There might be some nations who have better rates while decriminalizing drug usage but most of those nations actually do worse than the listed East/South East Asia nations and most developed nations are especially sad in that regard when a similarily developed nation such as Singapore with as comparable resources per capita are running circles around them but most important of all is that they still hand out death penalties for these crimes ... 

Blunt comparisons don't really do much good, especially when you choose them as poorly as you did here. Pretty sure you purposely picked all of the countries with abnormally high rates if they didn't have the death penalty and countries with low rates if they did. Kind of blatant bias there.

Now, first of all, as you said, yes, there are different circumstances for different countries outside of whether or not they have the death penalty or not, but that doesn't only apply to Iran. Every country has different factors contributing to drug use. That is why statistical calculations use controls to identify how much impact different factors have allowing you to look at how one single variable effects drug use. As I said before, I am not aware of any statistical calculations backing your hypothesis. (More on this as it relates to the USA later)

So, what is the next best thing? Well, if there is a clear pattern in countries compared to their neighbors, it isn't perfect, but it does say something. So what do we see?

China/Malaysia/Indonesia/Singapore/Thailand/Taiwan/Vietnam: These countries all have some degree of enforcement of the death penalty and they are all included in the East/SouthEast Asia block. Is there a clear trend here? Not really. Malaysia has some of the highest rates of executions in the region and they also have some of the highest abuse rates. On the other hand, Cambodia, South Korea, and The Philippines do not execute for drug crimes and they have some of the lowest rates in the region. 
Side Note: The data for China is taken in 2005. Since then, number of registered drug users has doubled. Taking this into consideration alongside estimates of an addict population of about 13million (for a limited range of drugs) and about 50% of the addict population being addicted to heroin, the 0.25 number jumps up to about 0.5.

Iran/Kuwait/Pakistan/Saudi Arabia: These countries all have some degree of enforcement of the death penalty and they are all included in the Near and Middle East/SouthWest Asia block. Is there a clear trend? Not really. While Saudi Arabia's rate of 0.06 is pretty low, Pakistan (0.7) and Iran (2.26) more than make up for that. Then you have Jordan with the same rate as Kuwait and UAE with a rate even lower than Saudi Arabia's. Also, as far as Iran, I think it works pretty well to show that the death penalty does not work as a deterrent. If the idea is to kill everyone involved with drug trafficking, that will never work unless the problem is 100% internal (and even if it is, the hubs will just move elsewhere and continue to feed your country if you crack down on it). You need the death penalty to scare people away from committing crimes and clearly in the case of Iran, it just doesn't work (Similar comments were made by the Malaysian government and many countries are moving away from the death penalty because it just doesn't work as well as they hoped).

Egypt: Egypt is the only country in North Africa which has a degree of enforcement of the death penalty. Is there a clear trend? Yes, actually. Egypt has significantly higher prevalence rates than the rest of the countries in that region.

Overall: There's really no overall pattern. While you can make a pretty convincing point by cherry picking data, the same can be said in the other direction. When you actually bring in some context, those patterns more or less disappear. 

For data on which countries have the death penalty, I used Harm Reduction International's classifications. High and Low Application are considered positive for the death penalty while Symbolic application (it is in the books but it isn't acted upon) is considered negative.
https://www.hri.global/files/2015/10/07/DeathPenaltyDrugs_Report_2015.pdf

So, if not the death penalty, what is the problem in the USA? Well if you look into the data, the problem is actually pretty clear. Prescription drugs. The majority of the opioid problem in the USA is prescription drug based, which implies an issue with how our medical systems deal with these drugs. If you look at only Opiate use (which excludes prescription drugs), the addict population drops to 0.57, which is pretty close to the global average (and pretty close to the revised estimates of usage in China) and this is with demand being fed by addicts who lost their prescription or access to prescriptions.

The evidence is simply not present to bring forth human rights violations of this caliber, especially when there are clear problems present which have clear solutions which do not violate human rights

Overall, there is more to say about general ideas about why the death penalty is often not an effective deterrent (especially for crime categories driven by organized crime such as drug trafficking), but I'll leave things here for now.

Not really because the majority of the countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Sri Lanka, Syria, Taiwan and United Arab Emirates have similarly low opioid prevalence rates among the age groups 15-64 ... (Actually death penalty is still legal in South Korea and for drug crimes too but for now it's on a moratorium and there's still prisoners on death row.) 

You may not like it but death penalty does work in the vast majority of the countries where data is available ... 

Similarily the Philippines used to have death penalty for drug crimes and it used to have low opoid prevalence along with it when the data was collected but ever since the death penalty was suspended in 2006 the nation was hit with a drug epidemic of massive proportions that lead to the election of Rodrigo Duterte ... 

You say that prescription opioids are the main problem problem in the US but that is not true since non-prescription opioids supply such as heroin or synthetic opioids are increasing at a faster rate and accounts for more deaths than prescription opioids ... 

You really aren't responding to what I am saying about geographical trends. When you look at the data, countries with a high prevalence of the death penalty don't really show any outstanding trends making it impossible to determine without in-depth statistical calculations whether or not there is any effect at all. The countries you are listing don't show any outstanding characteristics, and many of them are symbolic application states (like the USA) where executions for drug crimes either don't happen or are incredibly rare, making them poor poster-boys for your argument. 

As for prescriptions, again, just look at your data. About 90% of the use of opioids comes from prescription drugs in the USA. Actually, I'm not going to argue this point. Read your own sources:

"The opioid epidemic has its roots in the explosive growth of prescription painkillers."

"Unfortunately, as the supply of painkillers has dropped, many addicts have turned instead to heroin (see chart), which is cheap and plentiful. "

It is exactly as I said. People get hooked by prescription drugs and when they are unable to continue their prescription or find prescriptions, they turn to heroin (or other street opioids). Prescription drugs funnel addicts to street drugs (as I said earlier).

Which means that prescription opioids STOPPED being a problem ... 

Just because you pointed out that the users made a switch to a substitute doesn't mean that the last drug they used is still a CURRENT problem ... 

Pointing to prescription drugs is just a scapegoat when it's just a TOOL administered by doctors at their own discretion ... 

Those addicted seeking out other forms of opioids is a problem ... 

I've had some rather powerful pain killers offered to me by doctors for various issues. Once I went in to see my (now former) doctor curious about my back (was consistently aching and stiff) and the man basically just prescribed me muscle relaxers and some rather serious painkillers.

I had mostly just been curious as to what the cause was, though, and took up various stretches as I didn't much feel like beginning a lifelong dependency on muscle relaxers and painkillers in my 20's. My back is much better these days and my new doctor agrees that the old one took a very lazy, irresponsible approach to it. There's definitely doctors out there, then, that will just throw prescriptions at the problem long before they might actually be necessary.

The main issue with opioids is that studies have shown they're not particularly addictive so long as you are indeed in serious pain when you take them (I can verify this after a couple major operations), but if the pain is subsiding and you're still taking them they suddenly become seriously addictive. Doctors have begun to prescribe less than they believe you'll need, then, to avoid that dangerous window where they're no longer necessary but you still have a few left, but the more irresponsible doctors will happily offer extra pain killers should you request them.

No it doesn't. It means that prescription drugs are fueling demand. Obviously, that is a problem (and the 5+% of the population who are using them for non medical purposes are a little bit of an issue). If you reduce the prescribing of opioids, you reduce the demand for heroin. What aren't you understanding about that?

It gets kind of ridiculous for you to be saying "opioids are a huge problem in America, but 90% of addicts using Prescription opioids are irrelevant"... Doesn't that kind of invalidate your point that abuse rights in the USA are so high? If prescription opioids aren't a problem, then the abuse rate for the USA is still above average, but not by much.