The number of people dying from drug overdoses in New York City grew at a record pace throughout 2016, and health officials expect the final number to exceed 1,000.
The majority of overdose deaths in recent years have been caused by prescription painkillers and heroin, but a more potent drug contributed to the increase in 2016.
New York health officials reported that fentanyl, an opioid between 25 and 50 times the strength of heroin, was the cause of the rising numbers.
A November report from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene revealed that the number of drug overdoses in the first half of 2016 was on pace to surpass 2015.
| Borough | First half of 2016 | 2015 total |
| Staten Island | 51 | 69 |
| Queens | 104 | 144 |
| Manhattan | 115 | 145 |
| Bronx | 115 | 252 |
| Brooklyn | 120 | 223 |
Note: Deaths are categorized by residence, not the location where the death occurred.
The report also revealed that the number of deaths involving fentanyl in New York City had been steadily increasing since 2015.
Deaths involving fentanyl in New York City totaled:
- 194 from January to March 2015
- 221 from April to June 2015
- 259 from July to September 2015
- 263 from October to December 2015
- 287 (estimated) from January to March 2016
- 294 (estimated) from April to June 2016
Denise Paone, research director at the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, told NPR that fentanyl use in the city used to be rare. Now, it’s the cause of a record number of deaths.
Fentanyl is a prescription drug found in powerful pain patches or lozenges, but illicit drug labs have produced the chemical and sold it to drug traffickers. For years, drug dealers have laced heroin and with fentanyl to increase the potency of their supply.
“Not only are drug traffickers mixing it with heroin for street distribution, but drug suppliers are sending it in bulk form for resellers to sell in pill form or in bulk powder,” DEA Special Agent James Hunt told The New York Times.
But fentanyl is much more potent than heroin. It’s so strong that only people with severe addictions to opioids seek it.
“For the most part, drug users are not aware that they’re ingesting fentanyl, and they’re not seeking fentanyl,” Paone said.
In July 2016, law enforcement arrested 24 people and confiscated nearly 4 kilograms of heroin and fentanyl on Long Island. At that point, the DEA’s New York unit said it had seized 50 kilos of fentanyl, up from two kilos in 2015. Two months later, New York’s Organized Crime Task Force seized 33 kilograms of heroin and two kilograms of fentanyl in the largest bust in the task force’s history.
Fentanyl Surpasses Heroin as Deadliest Drug on Long Island
For the first time in seven years, the number of heroin deaths on Long Island seemed to decline, but another opioid took its place. Fentanyl was involved in at least 220 deaths in Nassau and Suffolk counties in 2016, according to statistics reported by The New York Times.
In Suffolk County, fentanyl caused at least 126 overdose deaths and heroin caused at least 93, according to a Dec. 23 report from the Suffolk County medical examiner. Final numbers for 2016 are not yet available.
Fentanyl deaths in the county increased 50 percent from 2015 to 2016, and heroin deaths decreased 40 percent. With about one week remaining in 2016, the total number of deaths involving opioids in Suffolk County reached 236. Opioids caused 85.3 percent of all overdose deaths in 2016, compared to 80.3 percent of deaths the year before.
In Suffolk County, other drugs involved in opioid-related deaths in 2016 included:
- Alcohol: 12 deaths
- Oxycodone: 49 deaths
- Benzodiazepines: 58 deaths
- Cocaine: 61 deaths
- Heroin: 93 deaths
- Fentanyl: 126 deaths
Rampant prescribing of opiate-based pain relievers such as oxycodone caused an increasing number of drug overdoses throughout the country in the late 1990s and 2000s. Oxycodone killed 91 people in Suffolk County in 2011. Since then, the number of oxycodone deaths has fluctuated between 46 and 63.
As oxycodone deaths declined, heroin deaths increased. In the past six years, the number of people who died from heroin in Suffolk Country equaled:
- 65 in 2011
- 85 in 2012
- 104 in 2013
- 114 in 2014
- 156 in 2015
- 93 in 2016
Public health experts believe large numbers of people addicted to opioids switched from prescription drugs to heroin because the street drug was cheaper and easier to find. If fentanyl continues to be more cheaply and readily available to drug dealers, it could be one more barrier to combatting the opioid epidemic.
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