Vancouver police officers turn their cameras toward the Downtown Eastside, documenting the lives of people experiencing addiction, homelessness, poverty, and severe social marginalization. Through repeated encounters and personal stories, the film follows individuals living on the streets while showing how officers’ attitudes begin to shift as they learn more about the people behind the addiction. Originally created in part as a drug-awareness project for youth, the documentary offers a stark look at substance use, stigma, survival, and the human consequences of life in one of Vancouver’s most vulnerable communities.
TOPICS: Canada, Homelessness, Law Enforcement, Personal Stories, Poverty, Public Health
For many students, heavy drinking is treated as a normal part of college life—but when does it become a problem? Following Rachel, a student who struggles to recognize the severity of her binge drinking, this documentary examines the normalization of alcohol misuse and the consequences that can follow. Alongside her story, individuals in recovery reflect on blackouts, trauma, addiction, and the experiences that eventually led them to seek help, revealing how quickly drinking can shift from a social activity into something that affects nearly every part of a person's life.
TOPICS: Alcohol, Alcohol Use Disorder, Drinking Culture, Personal Stories, Recovery, USA, Youth
Across Arkansas, individuals and families share deeply personal experiences of opioid addiction, overdose, loss, and recovery. Their stories reveal how prescription opioids, heroin, and fentanyl have shaped the state's opioid crisis, while experts explain how dependence and opioid use disorder can develop and why the drug supply has become increasingly dangerous. Alongside accounts of repeated overdose and lives lost are stories of survival and recovery, highlighting the work of healthcare professionals, advocates, families, and communities responding to the crisis and supporting people as they rebuild their lives.
San Diego County has become a major battleground in the fentanyl crisis, with counterfeit pills, drug trafficking, and online drug markets contributing to a devastating rise in overdose deaths. Families, survivors, law enforcement, medical professionals, and community advocates share their experiences while examining how fentanyl reaches local communities and why young people are particularly vulnerable. The investigation also explores efforts to save lives through naloxone, fentanyl test strips, low-barrier care, and medications for opioid use disorder, showing how prevention and treatment have become critical parts of the response.
What can the United States learn from Canada’s approach to the overdose crisis? ABC7 News reporter Tara Campbell travels to British Columbia to examine harm reduction and the services designed to keep people who use drugs alive and connected to care. Through personal stories and expert perspectives, the documentary explores supervised consumption, fentanyl, homelessness, trauma, stigma, and barriers to treatment. It also looks inside Insite, North America’s first legally sanctioned supervised consumption site, while examining the broader debate over whether similar approaches could help communities struggling with overdose in the United States.
Fentanyl has transformed Ontario’s opioid crisis, affecting people who use drugs, families, healthcare workers, law enforcement, and communities across the province. This three-part series combines personal stories with expert perspectives to examine fentanyl, prescription opioid addiction, overdose, and the challenges people face when seeking treatment. It also explores harm reduction, public education, law-enforcement responses, and efforts to prevent further deaths. Along the way, people directly affected by addiction share their experiences, showing why understanding the crisis requires looking beyond the drug itself to the people and circumstances behind it.
Families, harm-reduction workers, and experts share their experiences of North Carolina’s fentanyl epidemic and the devastating toll of overdose across the state. The documentary examines how the opioid crisis evolved from prescription medications to heroin and illicit fentanyl, while exploring drug trafficking, pharmaceutical accountability, and the state’s response to rising deaths. It also looks at harm-reduction efforts, including naloxone and fentanyl test strips, and follows people working directly with communities affected by addiction. Their stories show both the human cost of the crisis and the efforts underway to prevent further loss.
Brady began drinking as a teenager before alcohol became part of a growing cycle of cocaine, prescription pills, benzodiazepines, and eventually heroin addiction. He describes using different substances to control how he felt, the hopelessness and isolation that followed, and serious health consequences that still were not enough to make him stop. After treatment and relapse, Brady began to approach recovery differently. His story explores the progression of addiction and the difficult process of rebuilding a life through treatment, meaningful relationships, community support, and a commitment to making recovery his priority.
Ariel shares her addiction story, reflecting on the childhood abuse, trauma, homelessness, and instability that shaped her life and substance use. She speaks openly about methamphetamine, heroin, fentanyl, and crack cocaine, as well as the role drugs played in numbing painful experiences from her past. Follow-up interviews and updates over the next several years show Ariel continuing to struggle with addiction despite periods of treatment and attempts at recovery. Her story offers an honest look at the long and complicated nature of addiction, relapse, trauma, and the hope for change.
Parents who lost their children to fentanyl share deeply personal stories of addiction, overdose, and grief as the crisis takes a growing toll on young people in Fresno, California. Alongside their experiences, medical professionals, law enforcement, and frontline workers discuss the dangers of fentanyl and the challenges of responding to overdoses within their communities. The film also examines how substance use can remain hidden from families until it is too late, while emphasizing the need for greater awareness, education, and support for young people and their parents.
