American Overdose

Chris McGreal’s American Overdose is a devastating account of the U.S. opioid crisis, tracing how pharmaceutical companies, regulators, and medical institutions fueled a public health catastrophe. McGreal weaves together investigative reporting with personal stories, revealing the human cost of corporate greed and political failure. His writing is clear, urgent, and morally forceful, exposing a system that prioritised profit over lives. The narrative alternates between the intimate — families shattered by addiction — and the systemic, showing how policy choices enabled widespread harm. It is a powerful indictment of institutional corruption and neglect.