US overdose deaths down for the first time since 2018.

In 2023, the United States had a decrease in the number of deaths caused by drug overdoses for the first time since 2018. However, the government continues to be concerned about the fact that more than 100,000 deaths occur annually, the bulk of which are associated with fentanyl.

In a statement, Deb Houry, the medical director general of the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC), referred to this first reduction in five years as “encouraging news for our nation and shows that we are making progress.”

However, she went on to say that “that does not mean that we have accomplished our primary objective.” The fact that this pattern is occurring “should encourage us to intensify our efforts knowing that our strategies are working,” she went on to say.

There were around 107,000 deaths in the country due to overdoses in 2022, compared to more than 111,000 deaths in 2022, which is a decrease of 3%, according to provisional numbers that were announced on Wednesday by the authorities in charge of health in the United States.

The most significant contributor to the present overdose catastrophe in the United States is fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that is both very potent and highly addictive. It has been flooding the drug market for around ten years.

The number of deaths that were attributed to fentanyl decreased from in excess of 76,000 in 2022 to slightly under 75,000 in the most recent year.

According to Joseph Friedman, a researcher who specializes in this field at UCLA University in California, “many factors probably play a role” in this decline. Friedman made this statement in an interview with AFP. Specifically, “the intensification of treatments against addiction” and “increased access to naloxone,” which is an antidote that makes it feasible to resuscitate a victim of an opioid overdose, according to his estimation.

The fact that “the spread of fentanyl” has now “exhausted all the new places to establish itself” is yet another possible explanation, he noted.

The disparities that exist between the regions
Yet, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that the number of fatal overdoses involving cocaine or stimulants like methamphetamine has grown.

It is also observed that there are significant regional disparities: while the states of Nebraska, Kansas, and Maine experienced a decrease in the number of deaths by at least 15 percent, the states of Washington, Alaska, and Oregon, which are all located in the western part of the country, experienced an increase of at least 27 percent, according to the authorities.

“There is no indication that the fundamental structural factors of this crisis have changed significantly,” said Joseph Friedman. “This is despite the fact that the apparent stabilization of the number of deaths in comparison to previous increases is encouraging.”

“Continued efforts are required to encourage people who have been exposed to fentanyl to stabilize with safer opioids, such as methadone or buprenorphine,” he said. These opioids may be purchased with a prescription.

It was in the spring of 2023 when the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) made it possible for naloxone to be sold without a prescription for the very first time. The naloxone was available in the form of a nasal spray that was marketed under the brand name Narcan.

It was in the 1990s in the United States that the opioid crisis began. This crisis was caused by the excessive prescribing of opiates to the general public through the healthcare system, primarily for the purpose of treating pain.

During the time that the United States began to implement stringent access regulations, a portion of the population began to switch to heroin, which resulted in a sharp rise in the number of deaths that were associated with this drug beginning in 2010.

The third wave of the opioid epidemic began in 2013, when there was a dramatic rise in the number of deaths that were caused by synthetic opioids, especially fentanyl.

According to Joseph Friedman, who believes that this trend marks the beginning of a fourth wave, fentanyl is increasingly being “mixed with stimulants” in today’s society.

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