Paul Bass Photo
First responders address a 2018 mass overdose on the Green.
Overdose deaths have hit the Hill particularly hard since 2020, while non-fatal overdoses in the region were concentrated on or around the New Haven Green.
That’s one takeaway from a new report compiled by DataHaven.
The report analyzes recent fatal and non-fatal overdoses in the city of New Haven as well as in the Quinnipiack Valley Health District, comprising the towns of Bethany, Hamden, North Haven, and Woodbridge.
According to the report, the number of non-fatal overdoses in New Haven nearly doubled in 2020, from 551 in 2019 to 1,031 in the year that Covid-19 shut the city down.
Between 2020 and 2022, New Haven zip codes saw the highest overdose rates among the five towns accounted for in the report.
The zip code 06510, which includes the New Haven Green and surrounding streets, saw by far the highest non-fatal overdose rate in the area: 304 overdoses per 10,000 people.
Meanwhile, overdose deaths in the region were concentrated in the zip code 06519, which covers the Hill neighborhood. Between 2020 and 2023, 64 people died in the Hill, compared to 7 people who died on or around the Green during that time. That would scale up to a rate of 130.7 deaths per 100,000 people.
John Labieniec, the city’s COMPASS Crisis Response Team coordinator and a vice president of Continuum of Care, said the higher death rate in the Hill might be related to differences in the potency or types of drugs that people in different neighborhoods are purchasing. “If there’s a batch of something that’s deadly — that would be my first guess,” he said.
DataHaven’s report illustrates that in the five-town region, fentanyl-related overdoses have substantially grown; overdoses caused by xylazine, a veterinary tranquilizer, have crept up; and heroin-related overdoses have significantly decreased.
The report also noted ordinary members of the public have played a role in treating possible overdoses. Between July 2021 and July 2023, 81 “bystanders” unaffiliated with fire or police departments administered naloxone (Narcan) during a potential overdose in the region.
Labieniec said that COMPASS outreach workers respond to upticks in overdoses by canvassing the areas of the city where those overdoses have occurred and providing harm reduction supplies such as naloxone and fentanyl testing strips.
More data information on obtaining harm reduction supplies can be found on the city’s Harm Reduction Taskforce website.
If you are struggling with substance use, you are not alone. Local and national resources are available at https://connectgnh.org/. The Never Use Alone hotline is 1 – 800 – 484‑3731.
Some data from the report:
How the drugs causing fatal overdoses have changed over time.
Non-fatal overdoses in the area were concentrated around the New Haven Green.
Overdose deaths by Zip Code, with other potentially correlated factors.
Has Elicker and the Failed Unite Here Board of Alders figured out a way to distribute narcan to the NHPD yet?
Asking for a friend.