PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Rise in overdose deaths increasingly affects those with lower educational attainment, RAND study finds

Longstanding trend has surged during the pandemic

2023-10-06
(Press-News.org) Drug overdose deaths increased sharply among Americans without a college education and nearly doubled over a three-year period among those who don’t have a high school diploma, according to a new RAND Corporation study. The findings further highlight a potential association between the rise in drug overdose deaths and barriers to education access, a social determinant of health.  

 

Lower educational attainment has been one of the socioeconomic factors historically associated with drug use and overdose deaths, but the emergence of fentanyl in street drugs and the rise of the COVID-19 pandemic may have caused this longstanding health disparity to surge, according to the study.

 

The findings are published by the journal JAMA Health Forum.

 

“The analysis shows that the opioid crisis increasingly has become a crisis involving Americans without any college education,” said David Powell, the study’s author and a senior economist at RAND, a nonprofit research organization. “The study suggests large and growing education disparities within all racial and ethnic groups – disparities that have accelerated since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

 

Drug overdose deaths continue to surge in the U.S., contributing to declining life expectancy.   Much recent attention has focused on the demographics of the opioid crisis, documenting overdose death rates by sex, race and ethnicity and age. Less attention has focused on educational attainment – especially during the COVID-19 pandemic – despite its central importance in broader discussions of “deaths of despair.”

 

The RAND study examines how drug overdose deaths have disproportionately affected populations who are affected by lower educational attainment using more recent data than previous examinations of the issue.

 

Examining information from the National Vital Statistics System Mortality Multiple Cause-of-Death Data, Powell investigated the association between educational attainment with the rise in overdose deaths from 2000 to 2021. During that period, the analysis identified 912,057 overdose deaths with education information for those ages 25 and higher. Nearly 70% had no college experience, while the remainder had at least some college.

 

Overdose death rates increased from 2000 to 2021 for both education categories, but the no-college group experienced faster growth nearly every year.

 

For people with no college education, the overdose death rate increased from 12 deaths per 100,000 individuals in 2000 to 82 deaths per 100,000 in 2021. Among people with at least some college, the 2000 rate was 4.6 deaths per 100,000 individuals, growing to 18.6 deaths per 100,000 in 2021. 

 

The study also highlights overdose deaths from 2018-2021 among people without a high school diploma. During this short time overdose deaths among this group increased by 35 deaths per 100,000 people, or 83%. This compared to increases of 32 deaths per 100,000 for people with high school diplomas, 10 deaths per 100,000 for those with some college, and 2 deaths per 100,000 for those with a bachelor’s degree. 

 

The American Indian and Alaskan Native population showed substantially larger overdose rates than the rest of the population for every educational group, implying that race and ethnicity were independently associated with overdose death rate growth. 

 

Relative to White individuals, Black individuals experienced higher overdose death rates among people with high school diplomas. For those without a high school diploma, White individuals showed higher overdose death rates, though Black individuals experienced faster growth since 2018. 

 

The study highlights another crucial factor among populations disproportionately affected by overdose deaths, which could help inform development of effective and socially inclusive prevention and intervention strategies. It suggests the importance of providing additional resources, such as expanded treatment access and subsidized naloxone, to economically disadvantaged individuals and communities. It also highlights the potential gains of broader social and economic policies in addressing the opioid crisis.

 

“Understanding who is most affected by overdose deaths provides critical information about how resources, such as access to treatment and preventive medicine like naloxone, should be more effectively allocated,” Powell said.   

 

Support for the study was provided by the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health under award number 2P50DA046351-06A1 and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The content in this news release is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of these federal agencies.

 

RAND Health Care promotes healthier societies by improving health care systems in the United States and other countries.

END


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Deciphering the intensity of past ocean currents

Deciphering the intensity of past ocean currents
2023-10-06
Details of past climate conditions are revealed to researchers not only by sediment samples from the ocean floor, but also by the surface of the seafloor, which is exposed to currents that are constantly altering it. Deposits shaped by near-bottom currents are called contourites. These sediment deposits contain information about past ocean conditions as well as clues to climate. Contourites are often found on continental slopes or around deep-sea mountains. But they can be found in any environment where strong currents occur near the seafloor. The mechanisms that control them are not yet well understood. ...

How bacteria can organize themselves

How bacteria can organize themselves
2023-10-06
In a recent study, scientists from the department Living Matter Physics at MPI-DS developed a model describing communication pathways in bacterial populations. Bacteria show an overall organizational pattern by sensing the concentration of chemicals in their environment and adapting their motion. The structure only becomes visible on a higher level “We modeled the non-reciprocal interaction between two bacterial species”, first author Yu Duan explains. “This means that species A is chasing species B, whereas B is aiming to repel from A”, he continues. The researchers found, that just this chase-and-avoid interaction is sufficient to form a structural pattern. The ...

Pulsars may make dark matter glow

2023-10-06
The central question in the ongoing hunt for dark matter is: what is it made of? One possible answer is that dark matter consists of particles known as axions. A team of astrophysicists, led by researchers from the universities of Amsterdam and Princeton, has now shown that if dark matter consists of axions, it may reveal itself in the form of a subtle additional glow coming from pulsating stars. Dark matter may be the most sought-for constituent of our universe. Surprisingly, this mysterious form of matter, ...

Researchers create a neural network for genomics—one that explains how it achieves accurate predictions

2023-10-06
A team of New York University computer scientists has created a neural network that can explain how it reaches its predictions. The work reveals what accounts for the functionality of neural networks—the engines that drive artificial intelligence and machine learning—thereby illuminating a process that has largely been concealed from users.  The breakthrough centers on a specific usage of neural networks that has become popular in recent years—tackling challenging biological questions. Among these are examinations of the intricacies of ...

Astronomers discover first step toward planet formation

Astronomers discover first step toward planet formation
2023-10-06
Astronomers have gotten very good at spotting the signs of planet formation around stars. But for a complete understanding of planet formation, we also need to study examples where planet formation has not yet started. Looking for something and not finding it can be even more difficult than finding it sometimes, but new detailed observations of the young star DG Taurus show that it has a smooth protoplanetary disk without signs of planet formation. This successful non-detection of planet formation may indicate ...

Faster growth of the placenta is linked to increased risk of preeclampsia

2023-10-06
Research sheds light on how genetics influences the growth of the placenta and reveals a link to increased risk of disease in the mother. The placenta is an organ which grows in the womb alongside the foetus, which is attached to it by the umbilical cord. It is the only organ that contain tissue from both mother and child. The placenta provides oxygen and nutrients to the growing foetus and removes waste as the baby develops. A poorly functioning placenta is associated with pregnancy complications, and later risk of disease in the child. Despite its key role, little is yet known ...

Integrated chronic care in Africa can improve outcomes and save money

Integrated chronic care in Africa can improve outcomes and save money
2023-10-06
Across Africa about two million premature deaths each year are caused by the effects of diabetes and hypertension. In contrast, most people living with HIV are in regular care and virally suppressed, and HIV mortality rates have fallen five-fold since their peak of 2 million deaths annually in the early 2000s to less than 500,000 in 2022. Dr Josephine Birungi, a co-author and Graduate Researcher-Public Health at La Trobe University, said that the similarities in chronic disease management of HIV and other chronic conditions should make integrated clinics beneficial. “The only difference is the medicine they take. We’re seeing ...

ObesityWeek® features hundreds of innovative scientific abstracts

2023-10-06
ROCKVILLE, Md.— Neary 240 scientific abstracts covering a variety of topics such as anti-obesity medications, body mass index and pediatric obesity will be featured at the 41st Annual Meeting of The Obesity Society’s (TOS) at ObesityWeek® 2023. This in-person event will take place Oct. 14–17, 2023 at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas, Texas. Innovative scientific research results will be presented in both oral and poster formats. These communications provide notable exposure and recognition for studies and authors, and represent cutting-edge research in obesity prevention and ...

Colombian National Cancer Institute signs MOU with BGI Genomics to combat cancer

Colombian National Cancer Institute signs MOU with BGI Genomics to combat cancer
2023-10-06
On October 2, 2023, BGI Genomics signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Colombian National Cancer Institute (INC or Instituto Nacional de Cancerologia). This collaboration, which aims to foster research and further develop cutting-edge solutions based on genetic sequencing for early diagnosis of cervical and colorectal cancer, reflects a shared dedication to enhancing health outcomes in the region. The MoU was formally inked at INC facilities by Dr. Carolina Wiesner, INC Director, and Mr. Rainer Perez, alternate legal representative of BGI Genomics in Colombia. Mr. Marco Antonio Rincón, Latin America Business Director, BGI Genomics, notes: ...

Ginger pigment molecules found in fossil frogs

Ginger pigment molecules found in fossil frogs
2023-10-06
UCC palaeontologists discover molecular evidence of phaeomelanin, the pigment that produces ginger colouration.  “This will paint a more accurate picture of ancient animal colour.”  Phaeomelanin is now toxic to animals – discovery may be first step in understand its evolution.  Palaeontologists at University College Cork (UCC) have found the first molecular evidence of phaeomelanin, the pigment that produces ginger colouration, in the fossil record.   The new study reports ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

University of Tennessee, Lockheed Martin expand Master Research Agreement

Testing thousands of RNA enzymes helps find first ‘twister ribozyme’ in mammals

Groundbreaking study provides new evidence of when Earth was slushy

International survey of more than 1600 biomedical researchers on the perceived causes of irreproducibility of research results

Integrating data from different experimental approaches into one model is challenging – this study presents a community-based, full-scale in silico model of the rat hippocampal CA1 region that integra

SwRI awarded grant to characterize Las Moras Springs watershed

Water overuse in MATOPIBA could mean failure to meet up to 40% of local demand for crop irrigation

An extra year of education does not protect against brain aging

Researchers from Uppsala and Magdeburg obtain an ERC Synergy Grant to advance cancer immunotherapy

Deaf male mosquitoes don’t mate

Recognizing traumatic brain injury as a chronic condition fosters better care over the survivor’s lifetime

SwRI’s Dr. James Walker receives Distinguished Scientist Award from Hypervelocity Impact Society

A mother’s health problems pose a risk to her children

Ensuring a bright future for diamond electronics and sensors

The American Pediatric Society selects Dr. Maria Trent as the Recipient of the 2025 David G. Nichols Health Equity Award

The first 3D view of the formation and evolution of globular clusters

Towards a hydrogen-powered future: highly sensitive hydrogen detection system

Scanning synaptic receptors: A game-changer for understanding psychiatric disorders

High-quality nanomechanical resonators with built-in piezoelectricity

ERC Synergy Grants for 57 teams tackling major scientific challenges

Nordic research team receives €13 million to explore medieval book culture 

The origin of writing in Mesopotamia is tied to designs engraved on ancient cylinder seals

Explaining science through dance

Pioneering neuroendocrinologist's century of discovery launches major scientific tribute series

Gendered bilingualism in post-colonial Korea

Structural safety monitoring of buildings with color variations

Bio-based fibers could pose greater threat to the environment than conventional plastics

Bacteria breakthrough could accelerate mosquito control schemes

Argonne to help drive AI revolution in astronomy with new institute led by Northwestern University

Medicaid funding for addiction treatment hasn’t curbed overdose deaths

[Press-News.org] Rise in overdose deaths increasingly affects those with lower educational attainment, RAND study finds
Longstanding trend has surged during the pandemic