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Opioid death decline continues
But progress appears chiefly among whites
By Felice J. Freyer
Globe Staff

Deaths from opioid overdoses in Massachusetts continued to decline during the first three months of 2018, dropping by an estimated 5 percent over the same period last year, according to statistics released Tuesday by the state Department of Public Health.

The report also included updated figures for 2017, the first year to show a decline in deaths since the opioid crisis began in 2012.

Three months ago, the state reported an 8.3 percent decline in overdoses last year. But with additional cases confirmed since then, state officials adjusted their estimate, now reporting a 6 percent decrease in 2017, with a death toll of 2,016.

While the downturn from 2016 to 2017 is viewed as encouraging, the numbers are still very high: More people died of opioid overdoses last year than in 2015 or any previous year.

And the decline affects primarily white people. The opioid-related death rate for Hispanics doubled from 2014 to 2016, and then leveled off in 2017. Among blacks, the upward trend continued into 2017, with an 82 percent increase in deaths since 2014.

“The quarterly reports are snapshots in time, and they give us extremely useful information to better understand the trajectory of this epidemic,’’ Public Health Commissioner Monica Bharel said in a statement. “While we’re making progress, we continue to increase access to treatment and recovery supports, and will tailor responses for particular populations including black residents whose overdose death rates are increasing.’’

For the first time, the report provides information, broken down by race, on the substances involved in the recent deaths.

Cocaine is increasingly a factor in deaths among all races, but especially among blacks and Hispanics. The percentage of cases with both cocaine and fentanyl present, but no heroin, also rose, but was highest among blacks and Hispanics.

Whites, meanwhile, are more likely than blacks and Hispanics to die with benzodiazepines (tranquilizers) in their bodies.

The big killer remains fentanyl — not the prescribed painkiller, but illicit synthetic versions. Fentanyl was present in 85 percent of the overdose deaths for which toxicology tests were performed.

In another new feature, the state report lists the number of people who died in each community. Previously, only information about the residence of people who died was available.

For example, 187 Bostonians died of overdoses in 2017, but the report now also shows that 266 overdose deaths occurred in Boston.

Other findings:

■ Prescription medications play a diminishing role in the epidemic. In 2014, 26 percent of opioid-related overdose deaths with a toxicology screen showed evidence of a prescription opioid. In 2016, that had dropped 16 percent and remained stable in 2017.

■ Prescriptions for opioid painkillers in the first three months of this year dropped by more than 30 percent compared with the first quarter of 2015.

Felice J. Freyer can be reached at felice.freyer@globe.com.