Drug overdose deaths have nearly tripled in the United States since 1999, with whites and middle-aged Americans bearing much of the brunt, a new government report shows.
More than 16 out of every 100,000 Americans died of a drug overdose in 2015, compared to just over 6 in 1999, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found.
Heroin and other opioids accounted for about half of these deaths, a reflection of the damage wrought by the prescription painkiller epidemic this decade, said Dr. Edwin Salsitz, an addiction medicine specialist.
Overdose deaths are so common that they’re driving down the average life expectancy for white Americans, said Salsitz, who is with Mount Sinai Health System in New York City.
The CDC report, released Feb. 24, found that drug overdose deaths have risen among whites at a rate of about 7 percent each year, compared with 2 percent a year for blacks and Hispanics. The overdose death rate among whites in 2015 was nearly 3.5 times the rate it was in 1999.