San Francisco's fatal overdoses decline over past year
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Paul Harkin, director of harm reduction at GLIDE, hands out Narcan, fentanyl detection packets and other supplies in San Francisco in February. Photo: Nick Otto for the Washington Post
Accidental fatal drug overdoses in San Francisco are trending downward, despite a slight uptick from July to August, according to the latest data from the city medical examiner's office.
Why it matters: 2023 was San Francisco's deadliest year on record for accidental overdoses with 810.
- Yes, but: The latest numbers show about a 50% year-over-year decline.
By the numbers: In August, 45 people died from fatal overdoses compared to 88 people in August 2023.
What they're saying: "These numbers are encouraging but we still have so much work to do," Grant Colfax, the city's public health department director, said at a press conference last week. "We are certainly hopeful that this downward trend in overdose deaths continues but death rates remain far too high."
Threat level: Despite the year-to-year decline, there was still a slight uptick from July, when 41 people died.
- So far this year, 462 people in San Francisco have died from overdosing and the city is on pace to hit 693 by the end of 2024, according to an analysis by the San Francisco Chronicle.
The big picture: Fatal drug overdoses, which fell in the U.S. last year for the first time since before the pandemic, are continuing to decline, according to preliminary CDC data.
- Nationwide, overdoses kill more than 100,000 people a year.
- In the 12 months ending in April, there was a 10% decline nationwide and a 5% decline in deaths in California from the same period a year before.
The intrigue: Public health experts are stunned by how dramatically deaths are falling, NPR reports.
- "Everyone is going to come out and claim that what they did is what caused the decline," Daniel Ciccarone, a physician at the University of California, San Francisco, told NPR, but "what makes it fascinating is the speed at which it's happening."
The bottom line: We need more data and more research to determine what's driving the decline in deaths, but experts have theories.
- Naloxone is more widely available, and more drug users carry the medication with them for safety.
- Many of the pandemic-era circumstances — like social isolation, increased stress and people using drugs alone — may have diminished.