USA opioid deaths at an all-time high

Drug overdose deaths reached record highs in 2014, fueled largely by the abuse of narcotic painkillers and heroin, USA health officials reported Friday.

The CDC said 61% of the deaths involved some type of opioid pain relievers and heroin.

The CDC said that these numbers were based according to the death certificates and nearly half a million people in the United States died from drug overdose from the year 2012 through 2014.

Over the past year, obituaries spotlighting victims of drug addiction have put faces to these statistics.

In the same vein, recent exposés by the New York Times and NJ.com have shone a light on the pervasive use of heroine in suburban communities like Staten Island, New York and parts of New Jersey.

The five states with the highest drug overdose death rates were West Virginia, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Kentucky and Ohio.

Heroin, cocaine, painkillers, and sedatives are the most common drug used in an overdose death. The rate of opioid overdose deaths has tripled since 2000.

“To curb these trends and save lives, we must help prevent addiction and provide support and treatment to those who suffer from opioid use disorders”, Frieden said. About 9% of these cases (or an increase of more than 750 deaths) were caused by opioid pain relievers including hydrocodone and oxycodone. The new report, however, suggested that heroin-related death had something to do with the drug’s accessibility.

“More persons died from drug overdoses in the United States in 2014 than during any previous year on record”. The agency this week released draft guidelines for family doctors, encouraging them to be more careful about prescribing opioids for chronic pain.

In addition, some have also proposed expanded availability and wider access to naloxone-an antidote for opioid-related overdoses.

The use of synthetic opioids, like illicitly manufactured fentanyl, coincided with reports from law enforcement warning of increased availability of the drug.

The report also found 14 states that had overdose death increases it deemed “statistically significant” ranging from an 8.3 percent increase in IL to a 125 percent increase in North Dakota.

Heroin deaths also went up by 26% since 2013 with more than 10,000 people dead by 2014.