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Opioid Related Deaths Decline In First Half Of 2019

December 27th, 2019 by WCBC Radio

The good news is that opioid-related deaths in Maryland declined by 11.3 percent over the first six months of this year. The bad news: Health officials say the fatal overdose epidemic remains a crisis. While the second half numbers won’t be released until early next year- in the first half of 2019- there were 1,182 deaths attributed to opioids, heroin, and fentanyl.  That’s 133 fewer deaths than the first two quarters of 2018. Over the past two years, the rate of opioid-related deaths has slowly declined. There has also been a sharp decline in heroin and prescription opioid-related deaths, but the vast majority of those are caused by fentanyl, a synthetic, heroin-like substance that is immensely powerful and is often mixed with other drugs. Lt Governor Boyd Rutherford has headed the governor’s task force on the heroin and opioid epidemic- and he is encouraged by some of the trends- much work remains moving forward…

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