The number of deaths from heroin and other opioids continues to rise in New England. That’s according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In Rhode Island, 290 people died from accidental drug overdoses in 2015, an increase of more than 50 percent over the past five years.
The data was pulled from 28 states in the years 2014 and 2015, states which detailed information on death certificates about the specific drugs involved in an overdose.
And New England did not do well.
Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, and Connecticut — in that order — saw the largest percentage increases in all drug overdose deaths.
And when it came to heroin specifically, Connecticut and Massachusetts also saw large spikes in deaths related to that drug during the same period.
Last fall, Connecticut’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner projected accidental overdose deaths would rise again in 2016 — due, in part, to a surge in heroin and fentanyl misuse.
From 1999 through 2014, the CDC reports drug overdose deaths nationwide nearly tripled.
(This story comes from the New England News Collaborative.)
