US opioid epidemic rippling through healthcare system: CDC

Ambulance medics care for a man in his 40's who was found unresponsive after overdosing on an opioid in the Boston suburb of Salem, Massachusetts, August 9, 2017. (Reuters photo)

The US drug epidemic is overwhelming the country’s healthcare system, causing a spike in rates of hepatitis C virus related to increased opioid injections and reducing overall life expectancy among Americans, according to US health officials.

The opioid crisis is also reducing overall life expectancy among Americans, which has fallen for the second year in a row, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Thursday.

On average, Americans can now expect to live 78.6 years, a statistically significant drop of 0.1 year, the CDC said.

The news comes through a series of reports from the CDC showed that a total of 63,000 people died from drug overdoses in 2016, up 21 percent from 2015.

Opioid-related overdoses surged 28 percent, killing 42,249 people, mostly in the 25-to-54 age group.

“The escalating growth of opioid deaths is downright frightening – and it's getting worse,” John Auerbach, chief executive officer of the public health advocacy group Trust for America’s Health (TFAH), said in a statement.

“Every community has been impacted by this crisis," Auerbach said, adding that the government was not making the investments needed to "turn the tide."

In the United States, deaths from drug overdoses have surpassed deaths by firearms and motor vehicle crashes, according to a 2017 Drug Enforcement Administration report.

The increase largely stemmed from the continued escalation of deaths from fentanyl and other synthetic opioids, which jumped to 19,410 in 2016 from 9,580 in 2015 and 5,540 in 2014, according to a TFAH analysis of the report.

“These are not simply numbers - these are actual lives,” said Benjamin Miller, chief policy officer of Well Being Trust, a non-profit foundation focused on mental health issues. "Seeing the loss of life at this dramatic rate calls for more immediate action."

In a separate report, the CDC found a 133 percent increase in acute hepatitis C cases that coincided with a 93 percent increase in admissions for opioid injection between 2004 to 2014.

In November, US President Donald Trump declared the US drug crisis a “public health emergency.” He also announced an advertising campaign to combat the epidemic, but did not direct any new federal funding toward the effort.