Orange County opioid deaths rose to 131 in 2021 with fentanyl as factor in nearly all

Fatal opioid overdoses rose to their highest level yet in Orange County last year, with the powerful fentanyl as a factor in almost all of the 131 deaths in which the drugs were later identified, according to county data.

That toll was 8% higher than the 121 fatalities the county reported in 2020 and marked another increase after what had seemed a promising decline in 2019. The resurgence in 2020 was attributed partly to the isolation and reduced access to services that drug users experienced in the first year of the pandemic.

Neighboring Ulster County also reached a new peak in the opioid crisis with 71 deaths in 2021, an 11% increase over the previous year, according to that county's tally.

Orange County District Attorney David Hoovler said Friday that fentanyl has been taking its deadly toll both as illegally made pills and an additive to cocaine, heroin and other drugs. He called the synthetic opioid, which is up to 100 times stronger than morphine, a "huge problem" in the Hudson Valley and the U.S.

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One reason for the deaths is that counterfeit fentanyl pills sold on the street sometimes have a higher dosage than what doctors prescribe for patients to relieve severe pain, Hoovler said. Only a slight miscalculation in the illicit manufacturing can prove fatal.

"The people who make these things are not too precise," he said.

Drug dealers also add fentanyl to diluted cocaine and to heroin as a cheap ingredient with a potent kick. The deadly result is plain in the breakdown of the drugs involved in last year's fatalities that Orange County provided the Times Herald-Record: At least 36 of the overdose deaths involved a combination of cocaine and fentanyl.

Among the fatalities last year were a husband and wife from Port Jervis who both died at home in November, one day after another. Toxicology tests later determined that the couple, ages 67 and 50, both had morphine and fentanyl in their bodies, along with a sedative called clonazepam and - in the husband's case - a medicine used to treat schizophrenia.

Fentanyl has been circulating for years and already was involved in 59% of opioid deaths nationwide in 2017. But it has become such a persistent and ubiquitous menace that the first National Fentanyl Awareness Day will be held on May 10, organized by a coalition of businesses, nonprofits and government agencies.

State data shows Sullivan County had 48 opioid deaths in 2020, giving it by far the most fatalities per 100,000 residents out of all 57 New York counties outside New York City.

Neither the state nor the county has counts yet for Sullivan in 2021. But Albee Bockman, a Sullivan County coroner, told county lawmakers last week that the recent toll has been "staggering": 10 overdose deaths in the county in the last 45 days, including five in April and three so far in May.

Last year, 30-year-old Richard McInturff of Port Jervis was charged as a major trafficker, a criminal offense New York lawmakers created in 2009 to punish what they called "drug kingpins." He had sold more than $75,000 worth of heroin, fentanyl and other drugs in the last year and was arrested with 7,658 packets of heroin in his home, Hoovler's office said at the time.

McInturff faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted. His case is still pending in Orange County Court.

A state of Florida man pleaded guilty to drug-dealing charges in Sullivan County last week and faces up to 15 years in prison when he's sentenced in July. Jahmal Ford, 43, admitted attempting to operate as a major trafficker for trying to distribute heroin, cocaine and oxycodone in Sullivan County, working from his home in Kissimmee, Florida.

Chris McKenna covers government and politics for the Times Herald-Record and USA Today Network. Reach him at cmckenna@th-record.com.

This article originally appeared on Times Herald-Record: Orange County opioid overdoses rose to a new peak of 131 in 2021