Drug Overdose Deaths
With breaking news of multiple arrests in the drug overdose death of Matthew Perry, now is the time to warn your loved ones of these heartbreaking and cautionary facts:
1) If drug overdose deaths continue at their current rate, one in every 39 people in the U.S. will ultimately die of a drug overdose.
2) Per a 2023 paper in the Journal of Adolescent Health, “Adolescents are at a greater risk of death from substance use due to increased risk-taking behaviors, lack of experience, lower tolerance levels, and an optimistic bias that they are invincible to overdose.” The paper also notes that less dangerous drugs are often laced with highly toxic drugs like fentanyl, and people overdose because they are unaware of this.
3) Mexico is the primary source for these drugs, and the U.S. border with Mexico is currently less secure than ever recorded in the nation’s history.
4) Contrary to claims that legalizing marijuana and providing more drug treatment through laws like Obamacare would reduce such deaths, the drug overdose death rate has quintupled since 2000, and more than 100,000 people per year are now dying in this manner:
