Get the facts
Get the Facts
There is an opioid crisis in America that is killing our youth. According to the CDC, a total of 932,000 people have died from a drug overdose since 1999 (in the past 22 years, since Megan was born). In 2017 alone, 70,000 people died from a drug overdose. In 2018, we lost another 67,367 people to a drug overdose. And, more than 30% of those were 25 or under. Further, opioids are the cause of 70% of those deaths (46,802).
Drug overdose deaths in 2019 increased by 4.8% to 70,980 from 67,367 in 2018. And, of those, 71% (50,042) involved opioids. We lost almost another 94,000 in 2020, a 32% increase from 2019. Nearly 75% (69,000) of those deaths involved an opioid.
The new provisional data released by the Federal government estimates that nearly 108,000 people died from drug overdoses from January to December 2021. “That’s about a 15% increase from the number of deaths in 2020,” says Faridha Ahmad. “Over 80,000 of those deaths involved opioids, which was about a 15% increase from last year,” says Ahmad. Tragically, this is still going in the wrong direction setting yet another new record in 2021.
Currently, we are losing 295 of our children, siblings and loved ones per day. This is outrageous and should not be allowed, normalized or accepted. There is no better time than now to get involved – together we can save lives.
References:
The Drug Overdose Epidemic: Behind the Numbers
Drug overdose deaths jump in 2019 to nearly 71,000, a record high, CDC says