PROVIDENCE – Friday’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention opioid overdose report showed a decrease in overall deaths from 326 in 2016 to 320 in 2017 in Rhode Island, dropping the Ocean State two slots to the 11th highest opioid death rate among U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
Last year, Rhode Island had the 9th highest rate of deaths from opioid overdoses, according to the CDC, with a rate of 30 deaths per 100,000 people. The state now ranks below Massachusetts at 31.8 and above Connecticut at 30.9.
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Despite the decline, the opioid death rate in the Ocean State increased 0.2 percent from 30.8 in 2016.
Annemarie Beardsworth, spokeswoman at the R.I. Department of Health, said the RIDOH does not see cause to re-evaluate its assessment, reported by PBN in October, showing a modest decrease in overdose deaths from all drugs, with a continuing decline in 2018.
Beardsworth said Rhode Island’s statistics, taken from the state medical examiner’s office, are for overdoses from all drugs. The CDC, she said, recorded only opioid-related overdoses in their report.
In 2016, there were 336 overdose deaths from all drugs in Rhode Island, which fell to 323 overdose deaths from all drugs in 2017. Through the first 6 months of 2018, there were 157 overdose deaths in Rhode Island, RIDOH reported.
“We are confident that our numbers are valid from the medical examiner’s office,” Beardsworth said.
Nationally, according to the CDC, there were more than 70,000 drug overdose deaths from all drugs in 2017, with a rate of 21.7 per 100,000 population. Opioids were involved in more than two-thirds of overdose deaths in 2017.
Rob Borkowski is a PBN staff writer. He can be reached at Borkowski@PBN.com.
