Saving Lives: Steps Forward and Steps Backward

If you know someone who’s died of a drug overdose, you are far from alone. A new study from the esteemed RAND Corporation is shocking; it finds that <a href="https://www.rand.org/news/press/2024/02/21.html" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">2 in 5 Americans</a> know someone who’s died of a drug overdose. Here in New York, the problem is only getting worse. More than <a href="https://apps.health.ny.gov/public/tabvis/PHIG_Public/opioid-quarterly/reports/#state" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">5,100 New Yorkers</a> died from an opioid-related overdose in 2022 alone. That same year in New York City, a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-09-26/nyc-tallies-record-high-drug-overdose-deaths-in-2022?embedded-checkout=true" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">record</a> number of people died of overdoses; fentanyl was involved in the vast majority of those fatalities. I’ve <a href="https://davidsandman.medium.com/the-epidemic-within-the-pandemic-new-yorks-overdose-crisis-6a5a64737abd" rel="noopener">written before</a> that it’s become almost commonplace to see people overdosing publicly in New York. <a href="https://davidsandman.medium.com/saving-lives-steps-forward-and-steps-backward-d957ddca9e5f">Visit Now</a>