New Government Estimates Offer Early Hope That Drug Overdose Deaths Are Waning

After years of sharp increases in fatal drug overdoses in the U.S., provisional federal data provide reason for cautious optimism. The drug overdose death rate dropped slightly between 2017 and 2018, according to the new estimates, after two decades of near-constant upticks.

Between 1999 and 2017 the age-adjusted overdose mortality rate increased from 6.1 to 21.7 deaths per 100,000 people, according to federal data. According to data released June 11 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), that number dropped to an estimated 20.8 deaths per 100,000 for the 12 months ending in the second quarter of 2018. That figure isn’t final, and it shows only a modest downturn in drug deaths, but it’s still an encouraging sign after decades of snowballing substance use.

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