WHO Fact Sheet: Opioid Overdose

This article from The Lancet Public Health estimates the need for naloxone across fentanyl, heroin, and prescription opioid epidemics. Further, it provides evidence of the need to broaden naloxone distribution to reduce the incidence of fatal overdose. The authors found that demand for naloxone differed by epidemic type, with fentanyl epidemics having the highest probability of naloxone use during overdose events. Additionally, community-based and pharmacy-initiated naloxone access points had a higher likelihood of naloxone use and…

This case study from the Western Public Health Casebooks 2019 provides a fictional scenario related to the opioid crisis in Canada. The overall premise of the case is to explore the possibility of providing emergency Naloxone kits to patients in emergency rooms, as opioid related deaths in Canada have spiked in recent years. However, the current hospital staff are apprehensive about providing these kits to patients because they believe the kits will “enable drug users.”…

This article from Nature examines the history of the opioid epidemic in the U.S., providing context to the current state of the crisis. Starting in 2015, life expectancy in the United States entered a period of sustained decline – falling from 78.8 years in 2015 to 78.5 years in 2016 and 2017. The decline in life expectancy is explained by an increase in drug overdoses and suicides linked to opioids. The article outlines the different…