If Alaska statistics follow the rest of the country, new users will be white, in their 20's, and not necessarily from impoverished homes.  Women are the fastest growing segment.  

They usually started with prescription narcotics that flooded the market after Purdue Pharma released oxycontin and marketed it to doctors, telling them that users wouldn't get hooked on it because of its slow-release formula.  They lied.  Doctors handed the stuff out like it was aspirin, believing Purdue Pharma.  Pretty soon millions were dependent on the stuff, and medicine cabinets were full of it, ripe for their kids to swipe.  From oxy addiction it's a rapid slide to cheaper heroin, which has the same opioid in it.  Purdue paid  a $600 million fine for their deception, but that doesn't help the people who became addicted.

Blame the addicts for their decisions, but many started when they were teens (ever made a bad decision when you were that age?) and the drug industry had a big role.