• Posted November 14, 2024

New U.S. Overdose Death Numbers Show 'Sustained' Decline

After decades of battling the opioid epidemic, U.S. health officials reported Wednesday that overdose deaths have now declined for the second year in a row.

By how much did these deaths of despair drop? There were about 97,000 overdose deaths in the 12-month period that ended June 30, according to new provisional data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That’s down from an estimated 113,000 overdose deaths reported for the previous 12-month period.

“This is a pretty stunning and rapid reversal of drug overdose mortality numbers,” Brandon Marshall, a Brown University researcher who studies overdose trends, told the Associated Press. “This seems to be substantial and sustained. I think there’s real reason for hope here.”

Opioid painkillers first started fueling an increase in overdose death rates during the 1990s, followed by other more potent opioids like heroin and fentanyl. Provisional data had indicated a slight drop in overdose deaths for 2023, and the latest tally has kept that decline going.

While experts couldn't single out one factor that would explain the decrease, they did point to the pandemic as a possible player.

During lockdowns and social distancing, addiction treatment was hard to find and people were isolated -- with no one around to help if they overdosed.

“During the pandemic we saw such a meteoric rise in drug overdose deaths that it’s only natural we would see a decrease,” Farida Ahmad, of the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, told the AP.

On top of that, the increased availability of the overdose-reversing drug naloxone and addiction treatments such as buprenorphine may be saving lives, Erin Winstanley, a University of Pittsburgh professor who researches drug overdose trends, told the AP.

In the latest CDC data, overdose death reports are down in 45 states, with only five -- Alaska, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington -- reporting increases.

One limitation of the new provisional data is that it doesn’t detail what’s happening in different racial and ethnic groups.

“We really need more data from the CDC to learn whether these declines are being experienced in all racial ethnic subgroups,” Marshall noted.

More information

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has more on preventing overdoses.

SOURCE: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, provisional data, Nov. 13, 2024; Associated Press