400% Increase In Drug-Poisoning Deaths Involving Opioid Analgesics Between 1999 & 2011

From 1999 through 2011, the rate of opioid-analgesic poisoning deaths increased by nearly 400%, from 1.4 per 100,000 in 1999 to 5.4 per 100,000 in 2011. From 1999 through 2011, the age-adjusted death rates for drug poisoning from all types of drugs more than doubled from 6.1 per 100,000 in 1999 to 13.2 per 100,000 in 2011. In 2011, of the 41,340 deaths due to drug poisoning; 41% (16,917 deaths) involved opioid analgesics.

These findings were reported in “Drug-poisoning Deaths Involving Opioid Analgesics: United States, 1999-2011 . . .