In findings that suggest inroads are being made in the battle against America's opioid epidemic, new government data shows a 10% drop in overdose deaths. The statistics , compiled by states and posted by the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, show that just over 100,000 people died of a drug overdose during the 12-month period ending in April 2024. Dr. Rahul Gupta, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, described the drop as the largest on record and credited the administration's dual strategies of beefing up public health interventions while cracking down on drug suppliers.
"This has not happened by accident," Gupta told the Washington Post. Experts also credited the widespread availability of the overdose antidote naloxone, the Post reported. But there is also a less sunny analysis of the decline: Because fentanyl has taken so many lives in recent years, the group of potential victims has shrunken, Dr.
Daniel Ciccarone, a researcher at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine who studies overdose trends, speculated to the Post. Importantly, the CDC data remains preliminary and could change because state data lags as coroners and medical examiners conclude death investigations. Overdoses reached historic rates in recent years as fentanyl took over the nation's heroin supply, the Post reported.
Overdose deaths in 2021 topped 100,000 nationally for the first time. In 2022, the spike slowed but still reached nearl.