America’s ten-year-old fentanyl epidemic is still getting worse

America's ten-year-old fentanyl epidemic is still getting worse

It is testimony to the intractable nature of America's fentanyl epidemic that officials measure progress not in falling numbers of deaths, but in a slowing rate of growth. After a decade of horrifying ascent, ...,  the yearly number of fatal overdoses appears at last to be slowing to a gentle climb ... 

The figure for 2022 was just 5% higher than that of 2021. That still leaves fentanyl and other synthetic opioids like it killing some 75,000 people a year—more than double the figure of 2019. But in the fight against the deadliest narcotic in American history, that is what passes for success.

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(*) https://www.economist.com/briefing/2024/02/29/americas-ten-year-old-fentanyl-epidemic-is-still-getting-worse