“Tennessee is among the hardest-hit states when it comes to the opioid epidemic.”
That’s the first sentence of a state website dedicated to helping Tennesseans understand the enormity of the opioid epidemic here.
In 2017 – two years ago – 1,268 people died from opioid overdose deaths in Tennessee. The opioid-involved overdose deaths per 100,000 persons was 19.3.
And no wonder: The prescription rate per 100 persons was 94.4 – the third highest in the country and 1.5 times greater than the U.S. average.
Yes, that means more that 94 out of 100 people in Tennessee had an opioid prescription written for them in 2017. And despite increasing news stories and opioid education efforts, more than 6 million prescriptions were written the following year – 2018. Tennessee’s population is only 6.54 million people – and about 22 percent of those people are children under 18.