A recent study co-authored by a University of Kentucky researcher attempts to grapple with the national rise in drug overdose deaths and the impact that has on individuals and society.
Titled “An Overlooked Tragedy,” the study found that more than 40% of Americans know someone who passed away due to a drug overdose. Additionally, roughly one third of these people stated that the loss heavily disrupted their lives, and had notable effects on their physical or emotional well-being.
Published late last year in the American Journal of Public Health, the study was a collaboration between Dr. Julie Cerel, a professor at UK’s College of Social Work and director of the college’s Suicide Prevention and Exposure Lab (SPEL), and researchers Alison Athey and Beau Kilmer of RAND, an international nonprofit research organization that uses analysis to enhance policy and decision-making.
Cerel said the results highlight the psychological damage that follows in families and communities after a drug overdose death.
“What we know is the effects are really much further reaching and impact whole families and communities and schools and workplaces when they happen,” Cerel said.
Cerel, Athey and Kilmer surveyed over 2,000 participants in RAND’s American Life Panel. Respondents were asked whether or not they personally knew someone who had died from a drug overdose, and to describe the ways that the deaths had affected their lives.
According to the study, 42.4% of participants knew someone who had died due to a drug overdose. This means that, according to the team’s research, approximately 125 million Americans have been affected by drug overdose deaths.
The survey found that many people who knew someone who had died due to a drug overdose had been impacted by multiple drug-related deaths. The results show that 18.9% knew two to five people who died from fatal overdoses and 4.5% knew six or more people. It also found that 13% of respondents’ lives were disrupted in some way by the deaths and a little over 4% said that the loss had a “significant or devastating effect” on their lives.
The study also found that women, married individuals, indigenous Americans and people living in cities were more likely to know someone who had passed away from an overdose.
Cerel feels her work as a suicidologist has helped her to recognize parallels between those left behind by suicide, and those left behind by drug overdose deaths. She said that there are similar stigmas surrounding suicides and overdose deaths that keep people from sharing their stories, something she thinks makes processing grief more difficult for them.
“Most of my research has been on suicide bereavement, or what we refer to as suicide exposure. And when thinking about overdose, it's very similar,” she said.
Centers for Disease Control & Prevention statistics indicate that Kentucky had 2,381 drug overdose deaths in 2021, with a death rate of 55.6 (per 100,000 people). Many of these deaths were linked to either methamphetamines or opioids.
Cerel said the findings underline the necessity of conducting additional research on the prevalence and effects of overdose deaths – particularly in populations and groups with disproportionately high rates of loss – rather than on the heavily researched focus on ways to prevent them.
“I've talked with substance use or substance misuse researchers who were doing overdose research and said to them, ‘Can we look at the effects of people left behind?’ And essentially, their reaction has always been ‘No, we're interested in preventing overdose,’” she said. “Hopefully, this will help us begin to understand that those that overdose, and those people affected by overdose are overlapping communities. And that will actually prevent future overdose deaths.”
