Fentanyl killed 1,910 LA County residents in 2022, overtaking methamphetamine as the leading cause of overdoses and taking Black residents’ lives at a higher rate than any other racial/ethnic group.
That’s according to data from L.A. County’s public health department, which recorded a 13% spike fentanyl deaths in 2022 compared to the year prior — and a staggering 1,652% increase from the 109 deaths first recorded in 2016.
The synthetic opioid, which can be lethal in quantities as small as a few grains of sand, has been steadily claiming more lives every year since the county began tracking fentanyl deaths, although last year’s jump was lower than that seen in 2021.
“It does look like we’re slowing down (the rate of increase), but I don’t think any of that makes the situation better, given that we’re still in the worst overdose crisis in history,” said Dr. Gary Tsai, director of substance use prevention and control at the L.A. County Department of Public Health. “At no point in time has there been more overdoses than now.”
Public health officials have said they are also alarmed by the growing racial disparities seen in the fentanyl death data: While Black residents comprise 8% of the county’s population, they made up 21% of the deaths last year.
“It’s really striking what the rates are now for Black individuals dying of fentanyl,” said David Goodman-Meza, substance use researcher and assistant professor at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine.
“Unfortunately, because of systematic racism that Black individuals suffer in Los Angeles County, they tend to live in more marginalized communities,” he added. “And they are less likely to access services.”
When fentanyl first arrived in Los Angeles circa 2016, White residents were dying at the highest rates. But over the past seven years, the share of people of color dying has steadily increased.
The public health department counts a fentanyl overdose as any accidental…
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