Medscape (3/19, Brooks, Subscription Publication) reports, “Opioid overdose deaths in the United States involving prescription opioids and heroin decreased from 2017 to 2018, while deaths involving synthetic opioids (excluding methadone) increased,” CDC data indicate. Specifically, “from 2017, to 2018, US overdose death rates involving all opioids, prescription opioids, and heroin fell 2%, 13.5%, and 4.1%, respectively, while deaths involving synthetic opioids (other than methadone) jumped by 10%.”
Healio (3/19, Miller) reports the study authors “linked the decrease in prescription opioid-involved deaths to an increase in efforts to reduce high-dose opioid prescribing.” Investigators also “associated the increase in synthetic opioid-involved deaths to an uptick in illicitly manufactured fentanyl or fentanyl analogs in the illegal drug supply.” The findings were published online in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
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