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China vows to stem the supply of the powerful opioid fentanyl flowing into the United States. It pledges to target exports of fentanyl-related substances bound for the United States that are prohibited there, while sharing information with American law-enforcement authorities. Such promises, echoed in the recent meeting between the countries’ presidents, ring familiar. (Wee, 12/3)

“I think it’s a very good thing,” said Vanda Felbab-Brown an expert on illicit economies at the Brookings Institution. “However, I wouldn’t hold my breath on how big that impact will be.” Trump and some U.S. politicians are describing the deal in sweeping terms, issuing statements that China plans to completely control the substance, said Bryce Pardo, an associate policy researcher at the Rand Corp. The Chinese, by contrast, have said they’re going to enforce existing regulations. Both appear to be playing to powerful domestic interests. (Bernstein and Zezima, 12/3)

Insys had bribed doctors and their employees with payments for sham medical events that often turned out to be parties. Physicians who didn’t write prescriptions for the company’s powerful opioid were cut off from the company’s money. There were lavish dinners, strip-club visits and gun-range outings, all of which led to booming sales of one of the world’s most powerful — and dangerous — pain drugs. (Griffin, 12/4)

Dentists who prescribe opioid painkillers to teenagers and young adults after pulling their wisdom teeth may be putting their patients at risk of addiction, a new study finds. The study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine Monday, shines a light on the largely overlooked role dental prescriptions play in an epidemic of addiction that has swept the United States, leading to a record 70,237 drug overdose deaths in 2017. (Cohen, 12/3)

On Monday, NCADA announced that of the nearly 600 St. Louis-area adolescents who have participated in its Transitional Counseling Program since 2014, more than 75 percent successfully abstain from substance use throughout their enrollment in the grant-funded program, and more than 65 percent are still abstaining six months later. (Hemphill, 12/3)