Record 108,000 Americans Died From Overdoses In 2022: CDC
Meanwhile, Bloomberg notes 270,000 overdose deaths from fentanyl are playing a part in the presidential race. Separately, scientists say using GLP-1 drugs like Wegovy to treat addiction is showing “exciting” progress.
AP: Drug Overdoses Reach Another Record In 2022, CDC Says
Nearly 108,000 Americans died of drug overdoses in 2022, according to final federal figures released Thursday. Over the last two decades, the number of U.S. overdose deaths has risen almost every year and continued to break annual records — making it the worst overdose epidemic in American history. (Stobbe, 3/21)
Bloomberg: 270,000 Overdose Deaths Thrust Fentanyl Into Heart Of US Presidential Race
To understand the 2024 US presidential election, it is essential to understand the politics of fentanyl. Americans have been traumatized by a years-long wave of overdose deaths caused by the synthetic opioid. Once rarely used outside hospitals, fentanyl has become a ubiquitous street drug made by criminal gangs, often in Mexico, from cheap chemicals typically manufactured in China. It frequently is a hidden ingredient in other illicit drugs and can have fatal consequences for unsuspecting users. (Griffin, Meghjani, and Dmitrieva, 3/21)
Stat: Testing GLP-1 Drugs Like Wegovy To Treat Addiction Has ‘Exciting’ Data
Early data regarding the use of GLP-1 medications like Ozempic and Wegovy to treat addiction is “very, very, exciting,” Nora Volkow, the director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, said Thursday. (Facher, 3/21)
Stat: Ibogaine Psychedelic Therapy For Opioid Addiction Unlikely, Official Says
The psychedelic ibogaine is unlikely to ever receive approval as a treatment for opioid addiction, the federal government’s top addiction researcher said Thursday. The remarks from Nora Volkow, the longtime director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, serve as a cautionary note amid widespread enthusiasm about ibogaine, a naturally occurring substance that drug companies and researchers have increasingly cast as a potential paradigm-shifting addiction treatment. (Facher, 3/21)
The New York Times: The Psychedelic Evangelist
Before he died last year, Roland Griffiths was arguably the world’s most famous psychedelics researcher. Since 2006, his work has suggested that psilocybin, found in magic mushrooms, can induce mystical experiences, and that those experiences, in turn, can help treat anxiety, depression, addiction and the terror of death. (Borrell, 3/21)
CBS News: U.K. Cracks Down On Synthetic Opioid 10 Times Stronger Than Fentanyl Causing Overdoses In Europe
As authorities clamp down on fentanyl distribution and the amount of heroin produced in Afghanistan decreases under the Taliban, criminal enterprises have turned to a deadly alternative. Some health agencies in Europe are reporting a rise in deaths and overdoses from a type of synthetic opioid that can reportedly be hundreds of times stronger than heroin and up to forty times stronger than fentanyl. (Ott, 3/21)
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