OP disassociating at that point is OP exercising good judgement. It does not cancel out his observation that issues started.
The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation - and it is not even that these people took drugs with that expectation. Instead they took drugs expecting no issues will happen to them.
As is the assumption that it all went to shit, that's why this "story" is useless as some cautionary tale. "Started having problems" could mean anything, from "life spiraled out of control" to "their mom found out and bitched at them".
This is claim of later: the realities of recreational opioid use caught up with them and they were blind to the warning signs
There is no need for them experiencing the worst of heroine addiction or whatever for them to be wrong and or right. At that point, they has drug related issues so they were wrong.
Right, so what realities were that exactly? What "warning signs"? How do you know this wasn't just the OP projecting some bullshit that doesn't actually matter?
This isn't a convincing story that they were wrong if you don't actually know what happened to them. It just looks like you're showing a bit of that hubris yourself, in assuming they went off a cliff.