Checking the Vitals on Opioid Deaths

A new paper in the journal Addiction suggests the opioid crisis is even worse than official death counts suggest.
 
University of Rochester researchers found that in 20% of drug overdose deaths, death records didn’t specify the drug involved, and that 72% of those unspecified deaths resulted from opioids.
 
Their count added 99,000 additional opioid deaths from 1999-2016—raising the death toll 28%.   
 
Why were they missed?
 
States’ methods of investigating death vary widely, and that warps death counts in any number of crises—from opioids to COVID-19.
 
One key variable: Does the state hire a coroner or a highly trained medical examiner to determine causes of death?
 
The Atlantic