(Photo courtesy of Bay Ambulance, Baraga)

BARAGA — While the opioid crisis continues to plague the U.S., Michigan’s overdose rate has dropped in recent years.

Health officials and lawmakers are addressing the crisis by expanding access to life-saving drugs and enhancing support for substance-use disorder treatments.

Michigan has a lower overdose rate than the national average: The national rate per 100,000 people was 31.5, while the state’s rate was 28.2.

“Since the pandemic ended, nationally and in Michigan, those numbers have come down, but Michigan is doing much better than the national trend,” said Natasha Bagdasarian, the chief medical executive for the state. “We see the decline nationally, but our decline has been steeper.”

According to the state Department of Health and Human Services, the number of overdose deaths in 2023 was 2,826, a decrease from 3,096 in 2021.

However, she pointed to a large racial disparity in overdoses and said the decline has been mostly among white Michigan residents.

In 2023, while the state’s overall overdose rate was 28.2 per 100,000 residents, the rate for white residents was 22.6 and for Black residents was 64.5.

“One of the priorities is to make sure that we are making these tools available to the communities that are being hit hardest, and also understanding how dangerous the drug supply is in various communities is really important,” Bagdasarian said.

She chairs the Michigan Opioid Task Force, which began in 2022. The group includes staff from several state departments working to prevent drug misuse and make treatment more accessible.

She said there are four pillars to opioid response: prevention, harm reduction, treatment and recovery. Administering Narcan is part of harm reduction.

Naloxone, the generic name for Narcan, is an extremely effective life-saving drug that reverses overdoses.

Gary Wadaga, the director of Bay Ambulance in Baraga and a paramedic for 43 years, said his service used to get two calls a month for drug overdoses, and that number has dropped to one.

He said, “I truly believe that our number of overdose calls for opiate overdose, which includes heroin, has been great. The number of our calls has been greatly reduced since Narcan has been made more readily available.”

Wadaga said all paramedics carry Narcan with them and also have extra Narcan that they can leave with the patient or the patient’s family in case of a future emergency.

“The scary part is the opiate can outlast the effects of the Narcan,” said Wadaga. “If they’ve really loaded up and they receive Narcan, they can rather quickly go back into the state that they were in prior to the administration of Narcan.”

Bibhas Singia, the vice president and medical director for hospital and residential services at Pine Rest Christian Mental Health Services, said Narcan will reverse only opioid overdoses, not all drugs.

The organization has clinics in the Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Hastings, Holland and Traverse City areas.

In an overdose, Singia said there is too much opioid in the brain. It depresses the part of the brain that signals the chest to breathe and breathing stops when this signal is suppressed.

“What Narcan does is it goes in the blood, goes into the brain, and then dislodges the opioid which is attached to the receptors and then takes away the respiratory depression activity of the opioid – and people are able to breathe again,” said Singia.

According to the Department of Health and Human Services, legislation to increase access to naloxone is currently under review.

Experts say those who survive overdoses can have long-term mental and physical health problems.

Physically, Singia said, overdosing can permanently damage parts of the brain, which can lead to a stroke later in life. It can also have damaging cardiovascular effects and can permanently damage heart muscles.

Psychologically, Singia said, people may end up with different outlooks when surviving an overdose. Some may see it as a wake-up call, opting to receive help and participate in support groups. Others may have symptoms of depression and feelings of helplessness.

“I also don’t want us to miss the very important effects of overdose on the family members, the community and the society,” he said

“If somebody, unfortunately, passes away with an overdose, it has extreme mental health effects on their loved ones, their family members, their community. Even if they survive, it can still lead to feelings of fear, anxiety, depression and worry with their loved ones.”

Bagdasarian said preventative and recovery efforts have enabled the rate to decrease across the state. They include educating young people on substance abuse.

She said the earlier in life that people try drugs, the more inclined they are to develop a substance abuse disorder later in life.

For treatment, she said the task force is trying to ensure access to resources such as medication, transportation and housing. That includes ensuring that facilities providing care to people with these disorders are adequately staffed.

She said reducing overdoses and increasing recovery is “through listening to people who work on this issue every day, who work directly with clients and people with lived experience from every community around the state.”