Louis Theroux's latest documentary will be out early next month and it sounds like it's going to be heartbreaking.
The iconic filmmaker has three new documentaries airing on the BBC this year, with the first airing on Sunday 8 October at 9pm. Titled Louis Theroux: Dark States - Heroin Town, the hour-long programme will follow in the footsteps of his previous documentaries on drug use and addiction, examining America's relationship with prescription painkillers.
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Watch: Louis Theroux interviews a drug dealer
Credit: Louis Theroux: Law and Disorder in Philadelphia / BBC
The BBC describes it as follows: "America's love affair with prescription painkillers has led to widespread dependency on opiates. But following a crackdown on their over-prescription, where does this leave the two million Americans who have developed a habit for these high-strength painkillers?
"With the pills now becoming increasingly expensive and scarce on the black market, vast numbers of Americans have turned to the cheaper and stronger opiate: heroin. The drug now claims more lives in the US than either car accidents or gun crime. And, for the first time in over two decades, life expectancy in the US is declining - largely attributed to the rise in fatal heroin overdoses.
"In Huntington, West Virginia, Louis Theroux embeds himself in an Appalachian community that is being devastated and stretched to its limits by widespread heroin use. With one in ten babies in the city born dependent on opiates and a fatal overdose rate 13 times the national average, this is the epicentre of the most deadly drug epidemic in US history.
Credit: PA Images
"Louis spends time with the user community caught in the vice-like grip of drug misuse and follows the emergency services struggling to cope with multiple overdoses each day."
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He will appear in three films on BBC Two - the other two are titled Murder in Milwaukee and Sex Trafficking Houston - taking on the 'uniquely devastating challenges' currently facing America.
"I immerse myself in some of the most dysfunctional and disturbing aspects of American society," Theroux told the Independent earlier this year. "They combine hard-hitting actuality with intimate interviews."
He added: "I have been granted access to the police in several states; I've got to know the people affected by crime - and I've also spent time with the perpetrators of crime, with the idea of understanding the causes of it, both on a systemic level and also in a very personal way."
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Sounds like it's going to be really interesting, too.
Featured Image Credit: PATopics: louis theroux
