Health

How many drug overdose deaths happen every year in Georgia?

Data updated July 19, 2024
2,687 overdose deaths in 2022. That means that for every 100,000 people living in Georgia, 25 died of drug overdose. This is the highest drug overdose death rate the state has seen since data from 1999 became available.
Showing data for
In 2022,

25

per 100,000 people died of overdoses
In 2022,

2.7K

people died of overdoses
Unadjusted data about the nation is a useful starting point, but age-adjusted data tells a more complete story. Age-adjusting accounts for differences in age distributions across populations, which is crucial when comparing health outcomes since age is a major risk factor for many conditions. This adjustment enables fairer comparisons of mortality rates between different groups or over time. The rest of the data on this page is age-adjusted.
In 2022, Georgia had a drug overdose death rate lower than the US rate overall, nearly 24% lower. The drug overdose death rate in Georgia increased in 18 of the last 23 years for which data is available. The overdose death rate has increased 89% since 2018 and has increased 2.3 times since 2013.

In 2022, Georgia had a drug overdose death rate lower than the US rate.

Drug-involved overdose deaths in Georgia, age-adjusted rate per 100,000 people

The rise in drug overdose deaths nationally has been due to growing use of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids, however, this may vary by state. In 2022, fentanyl and other synthetic opioids were involved in more overdose deaths than any other drug, making up 64% of total overdose deaths in Georgia. The rates of drug overdose deaths involving fentanyl and methamphetamine increased 54.7 times and 46.0 times, respectively, between 2001 and 2022 for fentanyl and 2002 and 2022 for methamphetamine.

In 2022, fentanyl was involved in more overdose deaths than any other drug.

Drug-involved overdose deaths in Georgia, age-adjusted rate per 100,000 people

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Although drug overdose deaths are on the rise, they affect geographic areas differently. In 2022, the death rate for overdoses in Georgia ranged from 18 per 100,000 in Gwinnett County and Coweta County to 64 per 100,000 in Madison County.
Occasionally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will mark data as either suppressed or unreliable. Suppression occurs when data does not meet confidentiality requirements. As a result, data may not be available for every county in this state. Age-adjusted data is also not available at the county level. County-level tables reflect the most recent year of available data.

Drug-involved overdose deaths per 100,000 people (2022)

Drug-involved overdose deaths per 100,000 people (2022)

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