app.com: NJ drug deaths continue to soar as national numbers decline
6/19/2018
For the first time since the federal government declared the opioid crisis an epidemic in 2011, the number of U.S. overdose deaths is edging downward — despite unrelenting carnage in states such as New Jersey, according to new preliminary data.
Fatal overdoses nationwide — fueled by prescription drugs, heroin and other opioids — topped 70,000 for the 12-month period ending in September 2017, before showing slight declines in the 12-month periods ending in October 2017 and then November 2017. That's according to provisional figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.