Fatal overdose rates remain high in Virginia, even as the commonwealth begins to spread opioid settlement money to state and local agencies to help tackle the epidemic.
Death from drug overdoses, opioids and fentanyl, in particular has remained the dominant method of unnatural death in Virginia since 2013. Overdoses ticked slightly down last year, but the number is forecast to remain about the same or higher this year.
The state’s opioid epidemic was officially declared a public health emergency in 2016.
Read the full story in the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
