A new report from state health officials shows that six individuals on Martha’s Vineyard died from an opioid-related overdose in 2022, one of the highest marks in the past 10 years on the Island.
The most opiate-related deaths over the past decade was in 2015, when seven Islanders succumbed to an overdose; five people died in 2021.
The state Department of Public Health published the new statistics on Thursday as part of an annual study.
The high number on the Vineyard coincides with the largest number of opiate-related deaths ever recorded in Massachusetts. In 2022, roughly 2,300 individuals in the state died from an opioid-related overdose. That’s a 2.5 percent increase over 2021, and a nearly 10 percent increase from 2016.
For professionals in the field on the Island, the increase in substance use overdoses is not a surprise, but a sad reminder of the toll that the opiate crisis is still having on the Island and across the country.
“It’s not getting any better,” Brian Morris told The Times, a recovery coach and mental health and substance use disorder access coordinator with Island Health Care. “It validates what I’m seeing.”
Morris said that most tellingly, the report shows that marginalized communities are disproportionately affected by opiate use and substance use disorder. He said that the highest increase in the state data from 2021 to 2022 was among young, non-Hispanic Black men. Morris said there was about a 40 percent increase over the year in that population, and says there are early signs that trend is continuing in 2023.
Morris, who is studying a similar issue for his doctorate, said that the reason that community is disproportionately impacted is stigma. Marginalized communities don’t have access to the same type of care, whether because they don’t have adequate insurance or can’t receive a referral for treatment.
While the report is troubling, Morris says they are making strides on the Island. Since the pre-pandemic peak of opiate-related deaths in 2016, he has been working with Island police departments, schools, the county jail, and several healthcare organizations on the Island to increase access to crisis intervention, prevention, harm reduction, and treatment.
He does say that one resource lacking on the Vineyard is a detox facility. While there is a detox facility on the Cape, Morris says there is not a cost-effective way to create a detox facility on the Island. The Island has a partnership to find a bed for someone at Gosnold Treatment Center in Falmouth, a detox facility, that Morris says has been effective. But seeking help off-Island comes with its challenges.
Elsewhere in Massachusetts, following the latest overdose report, advocates supported a bill on Beacon Hill sponsored by Cape and Islands state Sen. Julian Cyr and Island Rep. Dylan Fernandes. The bill — H 1981 in the House and S 1242 in the Senate — would launch a pilot program for cities and towns to create “overdose prevention centers.”
Fernandes tells The Times that these facilities have been proven to save lives, reduce the spread of disease, and increase the rate at which individuals seek treatment. They’ve been set up in most developing countries, Fernandes said, and mostly recently in New York City.
At an overdose prevention center, someone struggling with substance use disorder can inject drugs under the watch of a medical professional, in an effort to prevent an overdose. Users will bring in their own substances for use, but clean needles will be available to cut down on the spread of disease. And Fernandes says that healthcare professionals onsite will offer ways for individuals to get treatment.
No such facility is planned for the Cape and the Islands, but Fernandes says it could be an option for local municipalities, should the bill pass.
“It’s pretty clear that we need some other tools to combat this pandemic,” Fernandes said. “It’s unconscionable to not consider programs that have proven to work.”
