Severe flooding raises deadly overdose risk in rural Appalachia, study finds – and the harm lasts for years

A new study finds that severe flooding in rural Appalachia is linked to a lasting rise in opioid overdose deaths. According to The Conversation, researchers examining floods with presidential disaster declarations between 2000 and 2017 found overdose death rates ran twenty-six percent higher in flood-hit counties for up to a decade afterward, compared with similar counties that weren't flooded. The Conversation reports the effect was strongest among people with no more than a high school education and in communities already classified as economically distressed. Researchers linked the increase to floods disrupting treatment access, destroying homes and jobs, and cutting people off from support networks and harm-reduction tools like naloxone.

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