The Justice Department will dispatch 12 federal prosecutors to cities ravaged by addiction who will focus exclusively on investigating health care fraud and opioid scams that are fueling the nation's drug abuse epidemic, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Wednesday.

He unveiled the pilot program during a speech in hard-hit Ohio, where eight people a day die of accidental overdoses.

“In recent years some of the government officials in our country I think have mistakenly sent mixed messages about the harmfulness of drugs,” Sessions said. “So let me say: We cannot capitulate intellectually or morally unto this kind of rampant drug abuse. We must create a culture that's hostile to drug abuse.”