The Washington Post (9/12, A1, Rich, Ovalle) reports, “The number of prescription opioid pain pills shipped in the United States plummeted nearly 45% between 2011 and 2019, new federal data shows, even as fatal overdoses rose to record levels as users increasingly used heroin, and then illegal fentanyl.” This indicates “users first got hooked by pain pills saturating the nation, then turned to cheaper and more readily available street drugs after law-enforcement crackdowns, public outcry and changes in how the medical community views prescribing opioids to treat pain.” In 2011, “the number of prescription hydrocodone and oxycodone pills peaked…at 12.8 billion pills,” then “dropped to less than 7.1 billion by 2019.” The only prescription opioid that saw increased use in this time period was buprenorphine, which is used to treat opioid addiction, increasing “from 42 million doses in 2006 to 577 million in 2019.”
The AP (9/12, Mulvihill) reports, “The fentanyl-driven crisis is more deadly than any other drug tragedy the nation has ever seen. In 2010, opioids were linked to just over 21,000 deaths in the U.S. In 2022, the opioid-related death toll was more than 82,000.”
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— “The Washington Post (requires login and subscription)