Number of Drug Overdose Deaths Fell in 2018
Drug overdose deaths in the United States declined 5.1% in 2018, according to data by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics.
According to the data, 68,500 Americans died of drug overdoses in 2018, compared to about 72,000 the year before, which is a 5% reduction in overdose deaths nationwide.
Opioids were the drugs most likely to be involved in fatal overdoses, but opioid deaths declined slightly, from about 49,000 in 2017 to a predicted 47,600 in 2018.
Deaths involving cocaine and psychostimulants like methamphetamine and MDMA rose slightly from 2017 to 2018. Cocaine was involved in 15,700 overdoses in 2018, up from about 15,000 in 2017, while psychostimulants were involved in 13,000 deaths in 2018, up from about 10,800 in 2017.
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