MARION — Marion County continues to try to stave off drug overdose deaths the year after setting a record high in 2017.

It is unclear how this year will compare with the last in terms of drug overdose deaths, but officials hope 2018 represents a decline.

By the coroner’s count, 32 people lost their lives to drug overdose in 2017, the highest number of lives claimed by accidental overdose in the county’s history. The next highest count was 29 people in 2014, according to previous reporting by the Star.

The youngest person to die from an overdose was a 23-year-old woman and the oldest was a 65-year-old man. Eleven were women and 21 were men.

Star readers and staffers selected the record number of fatal overdoses the No. 6 top story of 2018.

The Star talked to the family of one of the overdose victims, a 29-year-old man who had struggled with drug addiction for years, was trying to stay sober and was on track to regain custody of his three children when he relapsed.

The obituaries of the other 31 offer a glimpse of who they were.

Among them was a nurse, a machine operator, construction workers, a roofer and a salesman.

There was a grandmother who loved to bake desserts and whip up special breakfasts for her grandchildren; there was a man who had fought against the scourge of drug abuse at rallies; there was a voracious eater who was always “cheesing” and trying to put a smile on the faces of his friends and family, according to their obituaries.

The county won’t have a final count of the number of people who died from drug overdose this year until sometime in late winter or early spring 2019.

But preliminary numbers seem to suggest that it will be less than in 2017.

The Marion County Coroner’s Office has confirmed at least 14 deaths in the county were due to accidental drug overdose this year. The most recent of those deaths occurred in September, according to the office.

In 2017, 20 people had died from overdose by the end of August.

The coroner’s office declined to comment on the number of unconfirmed, but suspected drug overdose deaths so far this year. It typically takes between 12 and 15 months to complete autopsy reports.

The increase last year mirrored what is happening across the state. In Ohio, unintentional overdose deaths rose last year for the eighth year in a row, climbing nearly 20 percent over 2016 totals, from about 4,050 to a little over 4,850 fatal overdoses in 2017.

Locally, it is difficult to say what drives a spike in deadly overdoses, but Marion Police Lt. Chris Adkins has said that people who relapse after a period of sobriety have a reduced tolerance and are at a higher risk of fatally overdosing.

More: Sister of OD victim: ‘I was too late to save him’

More: Drug overdoses still rampant, but deaths down in Marion County

Stronger drugs being sold to users, whether unsuspecting or not, play a role, too.

In Marion County, the highly potent opioid fentanyl and related drugs like carfentanil were involved in far more overdoses last year than in previous years, when heroin, for example, counted more prominently among the drugs leading to fatal overdose.

And the synthetic opioid, which is tens of times more potent than heroin, is showing up in cocaine and meth as well as heroin, both death records and drug seizures show.

In 2017, a little over two out of every three overdose deaths here involved fentanyl or a related drug, according to autopsy reports. In most cases, more than one drug was involved in the death.

svolpenhei@gannett.com

740-375-5155

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