Head of US Health UU He says that overdose deaths begin to stabilize
Head of US Health UU He says that overdose deaths begin to stabilize
The number of deaths from drug overdoses in the United States has begun to stabilize after years of relentless increases driven by the opioid epidemic Health secretary Alex Azar he said on Tuesday, warning that it is too early to declare victory.
"We are very far from the end of the epidemic, but maybe we are, at the end of the beginning," Azar said in an interview. health care Event sponsored by the think tank of the Milken Institute.
Facing the opioid epidemic has been the rare problem that unites Republicans and Democrats in a politically divided nation. A bill that provides significant funding for treatment was approved under the former president Barack Obama. More money followed earlier this year under the president Donald Trump. And on Wednesday Trump is expected to sign the bipartisan legislation passed this month that increases access to treatment, among other steps.
More than 70,000 people died from drug overdoses last year, according to preliminary figures released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention this summer, an increase of 10 percent over 2016. Health and Human Services, the department of Heads of Chance, plays a central role The government response.
In his speech, Azar suggested that the multiple efforts to control the epidemic are paying off. He scored statistics that show an increase in treatment with medications such as buprenorphine and naltrexone. There is strong evidence to support medication-assisted treatment when used in conjunction with ongoing counseling and support. He also noted a much broader access to naloxone, a drug that reverses overdose, and a documented decrease in the number of people abusing prescribed opioids, as doctors take more care of the prescription.
Azar said that towards the end of last year and until the beginning of this year, the number of deaths "has begun to stabilize." Chance was not indicating that deaths are declining, but noted that they appear to be increasing at a slower pace than previously seen.
Earlier this month, the CDC released figures, also preliminary, that appear to show a slowdown in overdose deaths at the end of 2017 and the first three months of this year. From December to March, these figures show that the pace of the increase in the previous 12 months has been reduced from 10 percent to 3 percent, according to preliminary figures from the CDC.
Despite the slowdown, the nation is still in the midst of the deadliest drug overdose epidemic in its history. Opioids participated in most of the deaths, killing nearly 48,000 people last year.
While opioid and heroin prescription deaths appear to be declining, deaths related to fentanyl, cocaine and methamphetamines are increasing. Fentanyl is a much more powerful synthetic opioid than heroin, used as an additive in street drugs.
Advocates of people struggling with addiction said they do not believe the crisis is resolved quickly or easily. "Even if we are beginning to make a dent in opioid deaths, we still have a really important problem in this addicted country, and with the hopelessness and despair that many communities feel," said Chuck Ingoglia, vice president of the National Council. for behavioral health.
In the last year in office of President Barack Obama, his administration secured a commitment to expand treatment and Congress granted $ 1 billion in subsidies to the states. Trump declared the opioid epidemic a national emergency. Two important financing bills have passed under your supervision. While Trump made the headlines with his call to use the death penalty against the main drug traffickers, his administration relied on the treatment approach that Obama preferred.
The expansion of Medicaid into Obama's Affordable Care Act has also played a critical role, paying low-income adults to receive treatment. A recent analysis by the Associated Press showed that the states that expanded Medicaid are spending their new congressional opioid grant more judiciously, going beyond the basics like treatment for people in crisis. Trump tried to repeal the expansion of Medicaid, but failed.
Proponents of treatment say they are happy that more and more addiction is considered a disease and not a sign of moral weakness. But they say that EE. UU It has a long way to go to build what they call an "attention infrastructure", a system that incorporates prevention, treatment and recovery.
In an interview with The Associated Press this summer, a CDC expert said the numbers of deaths from overdoses appear to be improving, but it is too early to draw firm conclusions.
The data from one month to the next show a leveling in the number of deaths, said Bob Anderson, principal statistician at the National Center for Health Statistics. However, those numbers are considered preliminary, since investigations of deaths have not been completed in all cases.
"It seems that, at this point, we may have reached a peak and we may start to see a decline," Anderson said. "This reminds me of what we saw with HIV in the 90s."
The final numbers for 2018 will not be available until the end of next year and things could also get worse, not improve.
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AP medical writer, Carla K. Johnson reported from Seattle.
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In Internet:
CDC Overdose Death Control Panel: https://tinyurl.com/y75vu2dv
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