Drug-overdose deaths in the U.S. surged nearly 30% in 2020, the result of a deadlier supply and the destabilizing effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to preliminary federal data and public health officials.
The estimated 93,331 deaths from drug overdoses last year, a record high, represent the sharpest annual increase in at least three decades, and compare with an estimated toll of 72,151 deaths in 2019, according to provisional overdose-drug data released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Overdose deaths began rising in the fall of 2019 with the spread of fentanyl, but really took off starting in March 2020, when pandemic-driven shutdowns and physical-distancing measures set in.
Overdose deaths from opioids overall rose nearly 37%, according to the CDC data.
The deaths from drug overdoses form a twin public health crisis with Covid-19 and show how the human toll of the pandemic extends well beyond the estimated 377,883 U.S. deaths involving that disease last year.
Overdose deaths are helping to drive down U.S. life expectancy, which may have suffered the largest drop last year since 1943, during World War II. The CDC is expected to report preliminary 2020 life-expectancy data next week.
In Minnesota, the drug-overdose death rate for Black people was nearly twice that of white people in 2019, according to a report from the Minnesota Department of Health.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-drug-overdose-deaths-soared-nearly-30-in-2020-11626271200
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