PROVIDENCE – Over the first seven months of 2020, there has been a sharp increase in accidental drug overdose deaths in Rhode Island, according to new data from the R.I. Department of Health’s Office of the State Medical Examiner.
There have been 233 accidental drug overdose deaths between January and July 2020 compared to 185 during that same time period last year. Between the two periods, RIDOH announced that all drug fatal overdoses increased by 26% and opioid-involved fatal overdoses increased by 33%.
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During the month of July, more Rhode Islanders died of drug overdoses than any month since RIDOH started tracking fatal overdose data in 2014, according to RIDOH spokesman Joseph Wendelken. This trend isn’t just in Rhode Island, according to RIDOH’s announcement, but is being seen by public health officials on a national scale.
The isolation and stress of the pandemic may be a factor to this increase in what researchers are calling a “syndemic,” which is the amplified result of two or more diseases that exist simultaneously.
“The increased potency of drugs combined with the challenges of COVID-19 have stressed an already fragile system,” said Kathryn Power, director of the R.I. Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities & Hospitals.
Power said the challenges of COVID-19 may have led people who were in recover to relapse, while in other cases could have been people who use drugs occasionally, such as cocaine, might have overdosed because they didn’t know fentanyl was present.
“So many people have relapsed after evictions, layoffs, and traumatic losses- and these have hit racialized communities hardest. Addressing these issues at a systemic level is crucial going forward,” said Dr. Jon Soske, community engagement and education coordinator of Rhode Island Communities for Addiction Recovery, also known as RICARES.
However, Rhode Island’s increase in overdose deaths started before the state had its first COVID-19 case. Other factors that are likely contributors to the increase include people using more than one drug at a time, counterfeit pills and illegally-made fentanyl in drugs such as cocaine, counterfeit pills, methamphetamine, and other substances, according to RIDOH’s data.
RIDOH Director Dr. Nicole Alexander-Scott, who co-chairs Gov. Gina M. Raimondo’s Overdose Prevention and Intervention Task Force with Power, said Wednesday during the governor’s press conference that overdose deaths in Rhode Island are on track to reach a record-high in 2020, and is on target to surpass the prior record in 2016 by 25%. This comes as accidental drug overdose deaths decreased by more than 8% between 2016 and 2019, dropping from 336 to 308.
“What underlies the diseases of substance use disorder and COVID-19 are factors in our communities that affect people’s abilities to be healthy and safe, such as housing, employment, education, and discrimination,” said Dr. Alexander-Scott. “While getting prevention and treatment resources into the community to prevent overdoses immediately, we need to continue working to address these larger structural issues.”
According to the data, no one city or town in Rhode Island isn’t being impacted. However, overdose hotspots include Providence, Warwick, Woonsocket and Pawtucket. Fatal overdoses doubled among Warwick and Providence residents during the first six months of 2020 while North Kingstown and Scituate exceeded the number of fatal overdoses during the first six months of 2020 than the towns’ total numbers in all of 2019.
RIDOH said it will take strategic steps that will include increased outreach, housing support in Woonsocket and Providence for vulnerable populations and explore the development of an overdose prevention center that would include addiction treatment, sexually transmitted infection testing, housing support and basic services.
Alexa Gagosz is a PBN staff writer. Contact her at Gagosz@PBN.com. You may also follow her on Twitter at @AlexaGagosz.
