In a new study, researchers quantify how much pandemic safety measures and economic policies affected rates of overdoses in the United States.
Drug overdose rates skyrocketed in the United States during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the National Institutes of Health, more than 92,000 people died due to overdose in 2020. Public health experts worried early in the pandemic that lockdowns and other measures to control the spread of the virus could lead to more overdoses.
The new findings in the American Journal of Public Health provide answers to lawmakers and health leaders about future health policies and the unintended consequences that come with certain health measures, even if those measures were intended to save lives.
Douglas Wolf, Shannon Monnat, Emily Wiemers, Jennifer Karas Montez, and Yue Sun from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University are the study’s lead authors.
Here, Wolf and Monnat discuss the main findings of the work:
Former Syracuse University postdoctoral student Xue Zhang and Elyse Grossman, a scientists at the National Institute on Drug Abuse contributed to the work.
Source: Syracuse University