Alaska saw the nation's biggest increase in drug overdose deaths from 2020 to 2021. A new report outlines which groups were at the higher risk.
: men more than women, Alaska Native people more than other ethnic groups and Anchorage and Gulf Coast residents more than those in other parts of the state.
Drug mixtures were involved in most of the overdose deaths since 2017. In those years, 58% of the deaths were in cases where victims combined drugs from more than one narcotic, sedative or psychotropic category, the report said. About a third of the fatalities during that period were of people who had mixtures from at least three categories of drugs.
Among demographic groups, the overdose rate for males was 42.9 per 100,000, compared to 26.9 per 100,000 for females, the report said. Within Anchorage, the 2021 overdose death rate was 49.3 per 100,000 people, compared to the statewide rate of 35.2. The Gulf Coast had Alaska’s second-highest regional rate for 2021 overdose deaths at 40.3 per 100,000 people. The Gulf Coast includes the Kenai Peninsula and Kodiak Island boroughs and the Chugach and Copper River census areas.
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