The U.S. recorded its highest number of drug-overdose deaths in a one year period, according to the CDC.
There were an estimated 100,306 drug deaths in the 12 months running through April, the latest data shows. This marks a nearly 29% rise from the deaths recorded in the same period the previous year, per the Wall Street Journal.
“It’s telling us that 2021 looks like it will be worse than 2020,” Robert Anderson, chief of the CDC mortality statistics branch, said.
Opioid-related deaths, mainly caused by fentanyl, accounted for about 75 percent of the deaths through April.
Indeed, the pandemic worsened opioid overdoses due to isolation. The number of overdoses in 2020 surged to a record of about 93,330.
