Overdose victim on the way to the hospital: A fatal overdose occurs every five minutes in the United States. (Archive image from 2017)
(dpa) The number of drug-related deaths in the United States last year rose to a record high of more than 107,000 – the equivalent of one fatal overdose roughly every five minutes. The health authority CDC published preliminary data on Wednesday, according to which it assumes 107,622 drug-related deaths in the country with a good 330 million inhabitants in 2021.
This number increased by almost 15 percent compared to the previous year. The drug epidemic in the USA has been fueled by opioids for years. White House director of national drug control policy Rahul Gupta called the death toll “unacceptable.”
Last November, the CDC announced that the 100,000 drug-related deaths mark had been exceeded for the first time in a 12-month period in the United States: from May 2020 up to and including April 2021, the agency had assumed 100,306 overdose deaths.