ESCAMBIA COUNTY, Fla. — The state of Florida hit a turning point in the opioid crisis. This week, Gov. Ron DeSantis announced a drop in the number of fentanyl and opioid-related deaths.<\/p>\n
The numbers are from the newly released “2025 Interim Drugs Identified in Deceased Persons Report.” The opioid problem has been widespread in Northwest Florida.<\/p>\n
The attorney general’s office said Escambia County had the highest opioid-related death rate in the state just a few years ago.<\/p>\n
Many of us know of at least one person who has been affected by the crisis. For several health experts in the area, these new numbers are a sign of hope.<\/p>\n
Drug-related deaths in Florida have dropped 19% from January through June 2025. That’s according to new data from the Florida Medical Examiners Commission.<\/p>\n
“What this report shows is that our efforts are working,” said DeSantis. <\/p>\n
According to the data, fentanyl-caused deaths have declined by 46%. Opioid-caused deaths dropping by 42%.<\/p>\n
Deaths from cocaine and methamphetamine are also going down. It’s a trend seen statewide and in Northwest Florida.<\/p>\n
“We went from having almost every couple of hours at minimum getting called to some sort of overdose to where we’re just having a couple a day,” Dr. Benjamin Abo, Escambia County Public Safety’s chief medical officer. <\/p>\n
Opioid use has been a long-time battle in the Panhandle. Dr. Abo says Escambia County has gone from more than 150 opioid overdose deaths to now less than 20.<\/p>\n
Abo says there’s also fewer people turning to opioids. For him, these new numbers are also a personal victory. Abo says he lost a cousin to opioid addiction.<\/p>\n
“We still have a lot of usage,” Dr. Abo said. “We have a long way to go, but we’ve made tremendous strides.”<\/p>\n
At the state level, DeSantis credits the decline to the \u201cState Assistance for Fentanyl Eradication\u201d program, also known as \u201cS.A.F.E.\u201d<\/p>\n
The initiative funds law enforcement efforts for narcotics investigations. Progress is also happening at the county level.<\/p>\n
“Just yesterday, I got a call from a woman who was in our drug court program 10 years ago when I was a clinician,” said Dustin Perry, director of residential services at Lakeview Center. “And she has turned her life around. She runs a business, and she’s now a pastor in a church.”<\/p>\n
Perry is hands-on with opioid recovery at the Lakeview Center. He says increasing access to recovery services and lifesaving medication, like Narcan, can make all the difference.<\/p>\n
“If we continue to do what we’re doing, it has a great trajectory,” Perry said. <\/p>\n
Escambia County also reports a steady decline in Narcan utilization. A county spokesperson says that’s likely due to increased access and long-term treatment in the community.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ESCAMBIA COUNTY, Fla. — The state of Florida hit a turning point in the opioid crisis. This week,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271351,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-271350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271350\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}