U.S. overdose deaths surge to record levels in pandemic year; ‘There is no ceiling,’ says expert

America’s scourge of drug overdose deaths accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, with fatalities jumping by 27% in the 12 months ending in September, preliminary government data show.

The U.S. recorded more than 87,000 deaths in that 12-month period, putting the nation on track to shatter the dismal annual record of roughly 71,000 deaths it set in 2019, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Wednesday.

During the 12 months ending in September, drug deaths climbed in 49 states, according to the CDC’s data. Only South Dakota was spared an increase.

“It’s really bad,” Brendan Saloner, an addiction researcher at Johns Hopkins University, told the Daily News. “I see the curve getting steeper, but it’s also a continuity of what we’ve seen leading up to the pandemic year.”

Drug overdose deaths have climbed for year, but the pandemic appears to have prompted a staggering spike. (Lynne Sladky/)

“COVID has clearly not helped what was already a really volatile overdose death situation,” he added.

The CDC hasn’t published its final numbers for all of 2020.

A slight annual dip to under 68,000 deaths in 2018 had prompted cautious cheers from health experts. But the tally ticked up in 2019 and surged amid the cyclone of health catastrophes radiating from the coronavirus crisis.

In December, the CDC said that more than 81,000 people had died in a 12-month stretch ending in May. “The disruption to daily life due to the COVID-19 pandemic has hit those with substance use disorder hard,” Dr. Robert Redfield, then the director of the CDC, said in a statement at the time.

A slight annual dip in drug deaths to under 68,000 in 2018 had prompted cautious cheers. (Jessica Christian/)

Not only has the pandemic potentially inflamed substance abuse, it has also drawn attention away from the quarter-century-old opioid epidemic.

In the latest round of CDC data, New York State saw a 27% year-over-year spike in drug deaths, New Jersey logged a 7% increase and Connecticut recorded a 14% surge. Louisiana, meanwhile, saw the most dramatic rise of any state, at 54%

“I had been optimistic that there was some kind of ceiling to what we could see,” Saloner said. “And the reality is there is no ceiling.”