US overdose deaths fell through most of 2025, federal data reveals
[January 15, 2026]
By MIKE STOBBE
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. overdose deaths fell through most of last year,
suggesting a lasting improvement in an epidemic that had been worsening
for decades.
Federal data released Wednesday showed that overdose deaths have been
falling for more than two years — the longest drop in decades — but also
that the decline was slowing.
And the monthly death toll is still not back to what it was before the
COVID-19 pandemic, let alone where it was before the current overdose
epidemic struck decades ago, said Brandon Marshall, a Brown University
researcher who studies overdose trends.
“Overall I think this continues to be encouraging, especially since
we're seeing declines almost across the nation,” he said.
Overdose deaths fell in 45 states
Overdose deaths began steadily climbing in the 1990s with overdoses
involving opioid painkillers, followed by waves of deaths from heroin
and — more recently — illicit fentanyl. Deaths peaked nearly 110,000 in
2022, fell a little in 2023 and then plummeted 27% in 2024, to around
80,000. That was the largest one-year decline ever recorded.
The new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data runs through
August 2025 and represents the first update of monthly provisional drug
overdose deaths since the federal government shutdown.
An estimated 73,000 people died from overdoses in the 12-month period
that ended August 2025, down about 21% from the 92,000 in the previous
12-month period.
CDC officials reported that deaths were down in all states except
Arizona, Hawaii, Kansas, New Mexico and North Dakota. But they noted
it's likely that not all overdose deaths have been reported yet in every
state, and additional data in the future might affect that state count.
Researchers cannot yet say with confidence why deaths have gone down.
Experts have offered multiple possible explanations: increased
availability of the overdose-reversing drug naloxone, expanded addiction
treatment, shifts in how people use drugs, and the growing impact of
billions of dollars in opioid lawsuit settlement money.
Some also point to research that suggests the number of people likely to
overdose has been shrinking, as fewer teens take up drugs and many
illicit drug users have died.
Two other theories recently joined the list.
China regulation changes may be having an impact
In a paper published last week in the journal Science, University of
Maryland researchers point to the drug supply. They say regulatory
changes in China a few years ago appear to have diminished the
availability of precursor chemicals used to make fentanyl.
Their argument is based partly on information from the U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration, which last year reported that the purity —
and dangerous potency — of fentanyl rose early in the COVID-19 pandemic
but fell after 2022. It suggests it became harder to make fentanyl and
its potency was diluted.
One piece of evidence for that: More U.S.-based Reddit users reported a
fentanyl “drought” in 2023.
The authors connect that to signs that the Chinese government — at the
urging of U.S. officials — took steps in 2023 to clamp down on the
selling of substances used to make drugs. Information is limited on
exactly what the Chinese government did, and the paper is a bit
speculative, but “we thought we could make a case,” said Peter Reuter,
one of the authors.
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This Tuesday, April 1, 2025 photo shows the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention building in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Ben Gray,
file)
 The recent deceleration of overdose
deaths could be because producers in Canada and Mexico found
alternative sources, Reuter and his colleagues think.
Their paper drew inspiration from a team of University of Pittsburgh
researchers, who earlier concluded that regulatory changes in China
concerning the drug carfentanil were an important explanation for a
dip in U.S. overdose deaths in 2018.
Did pandemic stimulus payments play a role?
Those same Pittsburgh researchers — Dr. Donald Burke and Dr. Hawre
Jalal — are now focused on another theory for what's happened to
overdose deaths. In a paper published last week in the International
Journal of Drug Policy, they say overdose trends may be at least
partly tied to federal stimulus checks sent out during the COVID-19
pandemic.
The researchers tracked the three rounds of pandemic stimulus
payments to U.S. households in 2020 and 2021, and saw surges in
overdose deaths after each one.
That money alleviated economic hardship for many families, but some
of it also helped people pay for illicit drugs, the Pittsburgh
researchers say. And the end of those payments helps explain why
overdoses stabilized in 2022 and began falling afterward, they say.
Both arguments seem to have merit, though they do not prove
causation, said Dr. Daniel Ciccarone, a drug policy expert at the
University of California, San Francisco.
“I personally think it's more complicated,” with those partial
explanations layering on other trends, he said.
The Maryland and Pittsburgh researchers raised questions about
whether Trump administration policies could slow momentum.
They noted relations between the U.S. and China strained last year
when Trump placed sharply higher tariffs on imports from China, and
speculated China might ease efforts to police fentanyl precursors.
They also noted Trump has promised a $2,000 check to Americans to
help offset the rising prices resulting from tariffs placed on
China. Those checks could cause some drug users to splurge and
overdose, said Burke, who urged federal officials to think through
how the money is disbursed.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration this week canceled some 2,000
grants in a move expected to jeopardize programs that provide mental
health and drug treatment and prevention services.
___
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