The United States in 2020 saw the highest number of drug overdose deaths on record, “staggering” data from the National Center for Health Statistics showed. 

There were an estimated 93,331 deaths from overdoses last year amid the COVID-19 pandemic, about a 30 percent increase from 2019. This was the biggest jump from year to year since 2016, when the number of drug overdose deaths rose by 11,000, and it surpassed the record of 72,000 in 2019, The Associated Press reports. 

“This is a staggering loss of human life,”Brown University public health researcher Brandon Marshall said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention previously reported an “acceleration” of overdose deaths during the pandemic, with then-CDC Director Robert Redfield saying, “The disruption to daily life due to the COVID-19 pandemic has hit those with substance use disorder hard.”  69,710 of the overdose deaths in 2020 involved opioids. 

“Every one of those people, somebody loved them,” Stanford University professor Keith Humphreys told the Post. “It’s terrifying. It’s the biggest increase in overdose deaths in the history of the United States, and we’re not making progress. It’s really overwhelming.” (Associated Press, The Week 15 Jul 2021)

My comment: I wonder how many of these poor people were vaccinated? Is it fair to assume the answer to be ‘very few’? To be vaccinated, it seems to me, is to implicitly declare ‘I want to live’. To refuse vaccination and overdose indicates indifference to life – other people’s lives as well. (Associated Press and Washington Post)