The U.S. saw a slight decline in the number of new overdose deaths last year, marking a rare improvement in a still-raging national fentanyl crisis, preliminary federal data show.
There were about 107,500 overdose deaths in 2023, down 3% from the year before and the first decline in five years, according to estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. One factor was fewer deaths pegged to opioids including the nation’s deadliest drug, the potent synthetic fentanyl, the CDC’s preliminary numbers show.
The U.S. has struggled to stop a relentless increase in drug-overdose deaths, making 2023 a rare year. The last two declines came in 2018 and 1990, a year when there were just 8,400 overdose deaths nationwide.
Even as numbers trend lower, the U.S. recorded more than 100,000 overdose deaths for the third year in a row. Last year’s tally is roughly double the entire overdose fatality count from as recently as 2015.
@ISIDEWITH3wks3W
How would you personally measure the success of efforts to combat the overdose crisis, aside from just looking at the numbers?
@ISIDEWITH3wks3W
Do you believe that the decline in U.S. drug overdose deaths indicates a turning point in the fight against the opioid crisis, or is it a temporary change?
