Rise in State Opioid Deaths

Rise in State’s Opioid Overdose Deaths:

Pandemic + Fentanyl

By Nancy Robertson

Figures released this summer indicate that more than 94,000 people in the United States died of a drug overdose in 2020, up nearly 30% over 2019. While this figure is staggering, more alarming is data regarding Arkansas overdose deaths.

Arkansas is one of 10 states predicted to show at least a 40% rise in drug overdose deaths for 2020 over the previous 12-month period, according to the CDC. Data for 2020 and 2021 are still being collected, but the prediction of the “at least 40% rise” is being watched in Arkansas, California, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, and West Virginia.

The CDC says that several factors may be affecting the rise in overdose-related deaths, including the growing availability in Arkansas of fentanyl, a highly lethal synthetic opioid, and the stress people report relating to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Provisional data released in July indicate that the predicted number of opioid-related deaths in Arkansas for the 12-month period ending in January 2020 was 367. The number predicted for the 12-month period ending in January 2021 was 514 – a 40.1% change upward. Data for these time frames are still incomplete.

Kirk Lane, Arkansas Drug Director, says the rise in overdose deaths was not unexpected. “We were one of five states that actually reduced overdose deaths in 2019,” he says. “We have worked hard opening access to recovery programs, expanding Narcan programs, and increasing education. But when COVID-19 came along, things changed.” A number of resources for those in recovery necessarily shut down during the first months of the pandemic, and many in recovery found themselves cut off from their support groups. Social isolation affected not only this group but also people who had not suffered with addiction prior to the pandemic. Rates of depression rose. At the same time, Arkansas experienced a great influx of illicit fentanyl in 2020. And Arkansas remains the state with the second-highest opioid prescribing rate – an average of 86.3 opioid prescriptions per 100 people, Lane says. (Only Alabama’s prescribing rate is higher. The national average is 46.7 opioid prescriptions per 100 people.)

The combination of social isolation and easier access to opioids is proving lethal as overdoses increase. However, Arkansas continues its fight against overdose deaths. The Prescription Drug Monitoring Program (PDMP), enacted into law in 2015, provided a mechanism to stop multiple fulfillments of opioid prescriptions. Dual laws requiring co-prescriptions of overdose reversal drugs when opioids are prescribed and making it a felony to sell or traffic fentanyl are helping. So are the Arkansas Peers Recovery Together Program and the state’s 24-hour hotline, AR-CONNECT, that connects people fighting mental health issues or substance abuse to resources that can help them immediately.

Another resource, launched during the pandemic, is TOGETHER ARKANSAS. The program is a partnership of the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce, Walmart, the Arkansas Foundation for Medical Care, and Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield. It helps employers connect employees struggling with addiction to programs that can help. More information about Arkansas’s multi-level fight against opioid and substance abuse can be found at artakeback.org.