The fatal overdose epidemic in the United States, which began in the 90s with overdoses of prescription opioids, finally seemed to be turning around in 2018. But then the Covid pandemic hit, and amid increased isolation during the lockdown, fatal drug overdoses in the US skyrocketed, surpassing 100,000 deaths in a single year for the first time in 2021.
Synthetic opioids, such as fentanyl, have been the main driver of fatal overdoses over the past 10 years. Fentanyl is an extremely powerful narcotic that is often mixed into the American drug supply to make drugs — from heroin to cocaine to Adderall — stronger and more addictive. The result is that large numbers of people unknowingly take lethal doses of fentanyl with other drugs.
America’s “war on drugs” and punitive approaches to curbing drug use have not solved this. So now American communities are turning to approaches that emphasize “harm reduction”—creating environments for people with substance use disorders to seek support rather than punishment.
A big part of that is the distribution of the narcotic drug naloxone, also known as Narcan. Naloxone is an opioid antagonist, and can temporarily reverse an opioid overdose as it occurs. It does this by blocking opioid receptors in the brain.
Naloxone has been credited with saving hundreds of thousands of lives so far, according to the CDC, and is a tool to combat the ongoing overdose epidemic that some medical experts are now urging all Americans to have on hand.
Watch the video above to learn how naloxone can be a critical component in reversing the fatal overdose epidemic in the United States.
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