The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently reported record in 2017, but a handful of states saw a decrease last year including here in the Mountain West.
Each month the CDC puts out an updated snapshot of drug deaths from the previous year. A high percentage of those are related to opioids.
Preliminary data showed that the number of drug deaths in all of the Mountain West, except for Colorado, either went down or were static.
Bob Anderson is with the CDCs National Center for Health Statistics.
This could be just a little hiccup or kind of a stalling of the increase, Anderson said.
Wyoming had a dramatic reduction 33 percent fewer overdose deaths compared to the year before. But Kim Deti with the Wyoming Department of Health is urging caution about that change.
We dont have a full explanation for a one year drop. And we dont want to read too much into that either, she said.
Deti says Wyomings small population can make changes look bigger than those in more populous states and she said shes seen big swings like this before.
Still, Deti added there have been positive changes in Wyoming including increased access to the drug overdose medication naloxone.
This story was produced by the Mountain West 做窪惇蹋 Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, Yellowstone Public Radio in Montana, KUER in Salt Lake City and KRCC and KUNC in Colorado.
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