The Massachusetts Department of Public Health reported today on the opioid-related overdose rate in the commonwealth for 2017. The good news is the overdose death rate decreased by 8 percent from 2016 to 2017. 

But a closer look at the numbers reveals that overdoses from prescription opioids were found in around 20 percent of “opioid deaths with specific drugs present.” (See figure 4, page 3 of the report.)

A startling 83 percent had fentanyl present in their drug screens, 43 percent had heroin, and 41 percent had cocaine. The report stated that the fentanyl was “most likely illicitly produced and sold, not prescription fentanyl.”

The 20 percent of deaths in which prescription opioids were found in the screen does not break things down any further, but judging by the estimated 68 percent of opioid-related deaths that feature multiple drugs on board (such as benzodiazepines, fentanyl, heroin, cocaine, methamphetamines, alcohol), we can safely assume that the overdose rate due exclusively to prescription painkillers is significantly lower than 20 percent.

Meanwhile, policymakers stay fixated on pressuring doctors to prescribe fewer and lower doses of opioids for their patients in pain, and state attorneys general set their sights on suing opioid manufacturers, completely ignoring the fact that the overdose crisis has primarily been about nonmedical users accessing drugs in the dangerous black market. Prohibition is the real killer.