As U.S. Auto Plants Closed, Opioid Overdose Deaths Rose

Opioid overdose deaths have jumped in parts of the country where automotive assembly plants closed, demonstrating a link between economic downturn and the opioid crisis, according to astudy inJAMA Internal Medicine. Within five years of plant closure, opioid overdose deaths in the affected counties were 85% higher than expected compared with counties with no plant closures. “Our findings illustrate the importance of declining economic opportunity as an underlying factor associated with the opioid overdose crisis,” wrote Atheendar S. Venkataramani, M.D., Ph.D., of the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine and colleagues. “In particular, our findin gs, combined with a growing body of research demonstrating adverse associations between trade-related industrial decline and drug overdose mortality, lend support to the view that the current opioid overdose crisis may be associated in part with the same structural changes to the U.S. economy that h ave been responsible for worsening overall mortality among less-educated adults since the 1980s.”For their study, the researchers used data from industry trade publications, automotive company websites, and newspaper articles to build a database of all automotive assembly plants that were operational in 1999. Most of them were in the South and Midwest. The researchers also identified 112 counties that were within commuting distance of at least one automotive assembly plant. These counties were in the top fift...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: Atheendar S. Venkataramani auto plant closures JAMA Internal Medicine opioid overdose deaths opioids Source Type: research