New CDC data confirms that the U.S. is facing a drug crisis of unprecedented proportions, as overdose fatalities surge to the highest level ever recorded in a single year—more than 81,000 deaths in the 12-month period ending last June. The 20 percent increase reflects the overlapping health crises of COVID-19 and a pre-existing opioid epidemic, which have strained cash-strapped healthcare systems and addiction treatment providers that have been forced to curtail services. Public health officials are heavily focused on combating the coronavirus, while substance abuse has largely fallen off the radar, at a time when the isolation, stress and economic upheaval of the pandemic—all triggers for addiction and relapse—are increasing.
Meanwhile, just as Oregon enacts its groundbreaking law to decriminalize low-level drug possession to focus instead on treatment, lawmakers in neighboring Washington State are moving in the same direction. A similar bill has been introduced in the legislature, but apparently without any provision to mandate treatment—a fatal flaw also enshrined in the Oregon measure.
And finally, for the first time there is hard evidence that marijuana legalization can lead to an increase in driving while high. Officials in Colorado say a new tracking system shows that 47 percent of drivers are testing positive for marijuana followed by amphetamines and cocaine, and there has been a subsequent 48 percent uptick in DUI arrests involving pot in the last year. What’s more, the number of marijuana-impaired drivers involved in deadly crashes has risen every year between 2017 and 2019— a tragic fact that states pushing to legalize pot should consider.