A day after President Donald Trump declared opioid use a national public health emergency, the federal Drug Enforcement Agency announced the establishment of six new enforcement teams focused on combatting the flow of heroin and illicit fentanyl — one of the special teams will be based on Long Island.
The island, where Suffolk County has led the state in the number of opioid deaths among all counties outside New York City, is among communities “facing significant challenges with heroin and fentanyl,” the DEA said in a press release yesterday. The other special enforcement teams will be located in New Bedford, Massachusetts, Charleston, West Virginia, Cincinnati and Cleveland, Ohio and Raleigh, North Carolina.
The DEA’s stepped-up enforcement efforts in the six designated communities will have as its top priority “pursuing the criminal organizations that distribute their poison to our neighborhoods,” DEA acting administrator Robert Patterson said yesterday. “These teams will enhance DEA’s ability to combat trafficking in heroin, fentanyl, and fentanyl analogues and the violence associated with drug trafficking.”
Opioid overdose deaths rose to 10.4 per 100,000 people in 2015, the last year for which national data are available. Opioid overdose deaths in Suffolk County were 14.2 per 100,000 in 2015.
In 2016, the president said Thursday, drug overdose deaths are expected to exceed 64,000 nationwide, a rate of 175 per day.
“More people are dying from drug overdoses today than from gun homicides and motor vehicles combined. Think of it — motor vehicle crashes, gun homicides, more people by far from drug overdoses,” the president said during remarks at the White House Thursday, where he announced the declaration of a public health emergency.
While the opioid overdose death rate remained about the same in Suffolk from 2015 to 2016 — 14.2 deaths per 100,000 in 2015 and 13.7 deaths per 100,000 in 2016 — the proportion of deaths due to opioid pain reliever overdoses, as opposed to heroin overdoses, increased dramatically, according to data published by the New York State Health Department. In 2015 in Suffolk there were 9.1 heroin-overdose deaths per 100,000 and 7.9 deaths per 100,000 due to opioid pain reliever overdoses. In 2016, with 13.7 opioid overdose deaths per 100,000 in Suffolk, 11.1 (per 100,000) were from opioid pain reliever overdoses, while 4.8 deaths per 100,000 were from heroin overdoses, according to State Health Department data.
In 2016, more than 11.5 million Americans ages 12 and older reported misuse of prescription opioids in the past year, and nearly 950,000 Americans reported heroin use in the past year, according to the DEA.
“The abuse of controlled prescription drugs is inextricably linked with the threat the United States faces from the trafficking of heroin, fentanyl and fentanyl analogues,” the DEA said in a press release.
DEA announces prescription drug take-back events today
The DEA and local law enforcement agencies are holding prescription drug take-back events today across the country, including three in the local region, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Today’s take-back locations are: Peconic Bay Medical Center, 1300 Roanoke Avenue, Riverhead; Crohan Community Center, 655 Flanders Road, Flanders; and Southampton Town Police Department, 25 Ponquogue Avenue, Hampton Bays. A secure 24/7 drop-off container is permanently located at the Riverhead Town Police Department, 210 Howell Avenue, Riverhead.
The DEA is collecting pills and other solid forms of medication at the collection sites. (It cannot accept liquids, needles or sharps.) The service is free and anonymous, no questions asked.
For additional collection site locations, go to be located at www.DEATakeBack.com or call 800-882-9539.
