Kentucky is almost leading the nation in drug overdose deaths - that’s according to a report released Wednesday by the Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
“This report illustrates how evidence-based strategies can actually help prevent and reduce motor vehicle crashes, head injuries, fires, falls, homicide, suicide, assaults, sexual violence, child abuse, drug misuse, overdoses and more”, Levi said. North Dakota saw the lowest rate: Only 2.6 per 100,000 people died from drug overdoses in a year.
Accidental deaths are up in the United States, and the leading cause may surprise many people: It’s drug overdoses, according to a new report.
Utah had one of the highest rates of suicide deaths between 2011 and 2013, with 20.6 per 100,000 population, compared to the national rate of 12.5. Nine out of 10 of these deaths (nearly 44,000) are due to drugs.
Americans consume opioid pain relievers at a greater rate than the people of any other nation, and twice the rate per capita of the second-ranking nation, Canada.
The recent outbreak of hepatitis C, which can be transmitted by injecting drugs or having unprotected sex, is centered in rural areas among young, white drug users.
Unlike other forms of injury deaths, such as motor vehicle accidents, drownings and falls, public awareness about overdose deaths lags behind.
One of the indicators, for example, involves whether states have laws that expand access to naloxone, a prescription drug that can counter an overdose.
“The number of fall injuries and deaths are expected to increase as the baby boomer cohort ages; the number of seniors 65 and older will increase from 40 million to more than 88 million in 2050″, the report says. “More than half of these deaths (51.8 percent) were related to prescription drugs, with more than 16,000 deaths related to prescription painkillers, and almost 7,000 related to anxiety and sleep medications”, the report reads. The report’s authors also said Good Samaritan laws are beneficial to protect bystanders who call for medical assistance during an overdose.
Dr. Jerome Adams, Indiana’s state health commissioner, testified at a congressional hearing last month that opioid prescribing dropped 10 percent after the state implemented in 2012 new rules for physicians who prescribe opioids to treat chronic pain. A 2010 FBI raid shut down a Williamson clinic and resulted in six month prison sentences for two physicians and an office manager for misusing Drug Enforcement Administration registration numbers.
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