Overall Ventura County OD Deaths Down In 2023, Including Fentanyl, But The Battle Is Not Over

Wednesday February 28, 2024

     The Ventura County Medical Examiner's Office released its annual report on substance abuse deaths and while the numbers for 2023 were hopeful and showed overall deaths declining during the past three years, including for fentanyl, the battle to stop the scourge of drug and alcohol abuse is not over.

     That is especially true as it relates to fentanyl and opioids in general.

     Here is the report from the Medical Examiner's Office and it goes with the graphs they released that are shown above...

"2,035 deaths were reported to the Ventura County Medical Examiner’s Office during the 2023 calendar year. Jurisdiction was accepted for 1012 of these deaths, requiring further investigation and certification.

Postmortem examinations were performed on 785 cases.

Of the cases investigated, 265 deaths were due to overdose with medications, alcohol and or illicit drugs.

Of the 265 overdose deaths, 234 were accidents, 22 were suicides, eight deaths were of undetermined manner and one was a homicide.

Of these overdose deaths, men accounted for 201 deaths (76%) and women accounted for 64 deaths (24%)"

"Noteworthy trends:

1)The total number of overdoses in 2023 represent a 5% decrease since 2022 and a 8% decrease since 2021.

2)The number of fentanyl related overdoses decreased by 2% compared to the previous year.

3)Methamphetamine related overdoses decreased by 25% compared to the previous year.

4)The highest number of overdose deaths in 2023 were between ages 31 to 40 years (67 deaths). The highest number of fentanyl overdose deaths were between ages 31 and 40 (58 deaths).

5)The tranquilizer xylazine contributed to one death in 2023 which also involved fentanyl.

6)The designer drug and illicit benzodiazepine known as bromazolam contributed to seven deaths. All seven deaths also involved fentanyl."

      For more information meo.ventura.org