WASHINGTON – More people in Montgomery County die of heroin overdoses than homicides. Anne Arundel’s county executive is declaring it a public health emergency and now the state numbers are in: heroin deaths are increasing across Maryland.
Heroin-related deaths in 2014 outpaced the year before in Maryland.
“We have had an almost doubling of heroin deaths between 2010 and 2013,” says Kathy Rebbert-Franklin with Maryland’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene which tracks heroin related deaths in the state.
“It’s something that has been exacerbated by the recent influx of cheaper and purer heroin and some being mixed with fentanyl, which is a strong narcotic that can quickly cause death when abused,” she says.
There were than 450 heroin overdoses in the state last year. The hardest hit part of the state is Baltimore County, followed by Anne Arundel and Prince George’s counties.
“We have had over 300 overdoses in the last year and we’re currently experiencing a fatality a week which is unacceptable, ” says Anne Arundel county executive Steve Schuh declared a public health emergency, announcing the creation of a Heroin Action task force.
Schuh says he created the task force with the goal of increasing the availability of treatment options for residents, the availability of the overdose reversal drug for first responders and to increase the public education effort.
“We’ve got to attack this challenge head-on by creating an action plan we will implement over the next year to expand our treatment service and to get these drug dealers off the streets and in jail where they belong,” Schuh says.
