By Michael V. Cusenza
In the Empire State, opioid-related deaths peaked in mid-2023 at 85,387 deaths in the 12-month period ending in July 2023. Deaths have since declined to 71,484 by June 2024, marking a 16-percent drop, according to a new study completed on behalf of Addiction-Rep, a marketing firm for rehab centers.
Other key opioid-related death takeaways for New York include:
- The Toll of Synthetic Opioids: Synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl, remain the leading cause of opioid-related fatalities, though deaths from these drugs declined nearly 20 percent year-over-year from June 2023 to June 2024.
- Heroin’s Rapid Decline: Heroin-related deaths have fallen dramatically over the past five years, dropping from 14,743 in 2019 to 3,242 in 2024—a decline of nearly 80 percent.
- Men Disproportionately Affected: Men continue to account for the majority of opioid-related deaths, but fatality rates for both men and women declined by nearly 19 percent year-over-year.
- The Opioid Crisis in New York State: In the 12 months ending in June 2023, New York State saw 28.8 opioid-related deaths per 100,000 residents. By June 2024, this figure had dropped to 22.9, representing a year-over-year decline of 20.5 percent.
The country has been battling an opioid crisis for decades, marked by three distinct waves of rising overdose deaths. The first wave began in the 1990s with the widespread overprescription of opioid painkillers, leading to a sharp increase in opioid dependency. The second wave emerged around 2010, driven by a surge in heroin use as access to prescription opioids became more restricted. The third and most deadly wave began in 2013, fueled by the proliferation of illicitly manufactured fentanyl and other synthetic opioids, which are significantly more potent and lethal than their predecessors.
In response to the crisis, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services declared the opioid epidemic a public health emergency in 2017. But despite federal and state interventions, opioid-related deaths continued to rise, claiming more than half a million lives between 2014 and 2023. Opioid-related fatalities declined in 2023 and continued to fall during the first half of 2024, marking a potential turning point in the crisis.
While some states have made significant progress in reducing opioid-related deaths, others continue to struggle, raising concerns about the epidemic’s long-term trajectory. To better understand these shifting patterns, researchers at Addiction-Rep analyzed the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through June 2024. Their findings highlight key trends in the nation’s ongoing fight against opioid fatalities, including which states are experiencing the steepest declines—and where the crisis remains entrenched.
Synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl, remain the leading cause of opioid-related deaths in the U.S., though fatalities have started to decline. In the 12-month period ending in June 2024, deaths from synthetic opioids fell nearly 20 percent compared to the 12-month period ending in June 2023, dropping from 77,669 to 62,364.
Meanwhile, deaths from heroin have been steadily declining for years. In the 12-month period ending in June 2019, heroin was responsible for 14,743 deaths, but by June 2023, that number had dropped to 4,973, a 66-percent decline over four years. The trend continued into June 2024, with heroin-related deaths falling another 35 percent to 3,242.
