That's my point, the effects of that on overdose deaths would take a while to happen. it's not like everyone who gets prescribed opioids immediately gets hooked

That's my point, the effects of that on overdose deaths would take a while to happen. it's not like everyone who gets prescribed opioids immediately gets hooked and ODs and even after they're cut off they don't immediately go and OD on heroin or other illegally sourced opioids. There's a built in time lag between the reduction in prescriptions and the OD deaths they caused, measured in years in a lot of cases.