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Almost three-quarters of fatal overdoses have been attributed to opioids, an increase from just over 70% in 2019, largely due to the potent synthetic opioid fentanyl. Deaths from cocaine and methamphetamine have also continued to increase for years.
The CDC figures were released a day after President Joe Biden appointed former West Virginia health commissioner Rahul Gupta to lead the federal response to the long-running drug crisis. Gupta, who likely won’t be confirmed as the country’s drug czar until the fall, is nationally recognized for the data-driven approach he has taken to tackling drugs in West Virginia , one of the states hardest hit by the opioid epidemic.
But health officials and experts fear the political will to deal with the drug crisis will wane after the pandemic absorbs public attention and depletes public health services.
“It’s not a priority,” said Nora Volkow, longtime director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. “Drug addiction is a neglected disease.
Drug overdose deaths rose every year for nearly three decades before dropping slightly in 2018. At the time, there was cautious optimism that the tide was starting to turn, with Congress investing billions of dollars. in treatment and prevention. Now it looks like 2018 has been an aberration, said Robert Anderson, chief of mortality statistics at the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics.
“I guess it was just fluke,” he said. “This is what it looks like.”
Overdose deaths increased in 2019 and early 2020, before accelerating again once the coronavirus emerged and caused major upheavals in daily life.
Under-staffed local health departments leading prevention and recovery efforts have turned to testing and tracing for the coronavirus. Social service programs that relied on outreach and in-person visits have been shut down, while inpatient treatment centers have reduced the number of people they agreed to abide by social distancing rules. Ambulatory care centers attempted to maintain operations through virtual visits.
“It wasn’t just the political leaders who weren’t paying attention, it was the circumstances around Covid,” said Chuck Ingoglia, president and CEO of the National Council for Mental Welfare, an association professional for mental health and addiction providers.
But drug policy experts fear the all-consuming attention to Covid-19 has diverted energy from a problem that is spiraling out of control.
“We looked away from the bullet,” said Kevin Sabet, who previously worked in the White House drug office and founded Smart Approaches to Marijuana. “Drugs haven’t been a sexy enough problem, although to deal with this unprecedented overdose crisis we need a holistic approach. “
Erin Banco contributed to this report.
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