Opioid prescription has tripled from 1999 to 2015. Meanwhile, deaths only started to skyrocket very recently (starting in 2010-2011), probably mostly due to cheap heroin being adulterated with fentanyl.

Opioid abuse is mostly flat or (among youth) decreasing:

https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/NSDUH-FRR1-2...

http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/monographs/mtf-overv...

There is no actual link between opioid prescription and subsequent heroin use shown by any research.

https://grokinfullness.blogspot.com/2017/09/debunking-standa...