Montgomery County reports drop in overdose deaths, approves JUUL/Altria funds for youth vaping prevention and community grants

County Health Officer Dr. Keisha Davis told a Montgomery County Council committee that drug-induced mortalities and fentanyl-related deaths in the county declined in calendar year 2024 and presented county data and program updates for adolescent substance use and overdose response.

The report showed 83 fatal overdoses in 2024 across all ages, 81 percent of those decedents were male, and county health staff said the county saw an approximately 40 percent decrease in fatal overdoses and a 52 percent decrease in fentanyl fatalities compared with the prior year. Dr. Davis cautioned the numbers are drawn from multiple sources — the Maryland Department of Health chief medical examiner data, EMS, hospital emergency records and other surveillance systems — and called the presentation “just scratching the surface on the data that’s available.”

The county highlighted that overdose fatalities among people under 20 remained a suppressed count (fewer than 11 in 2023 and in 2024), and that emergency-room opioid-related visits rose in 2023 and decreased overall in 2024, except for an increase in the 15–17 age group. Health staff also reported demographic patterns: Hispanic and Black youth saw higher counts during the 2018–2023 period while white youth showed a sharper decline, and the 55-and-older age group showed an increasing trend separate from youth trends.

Health officials described county treatment and prevention services currently operating or newly launched: a residential youth withdrawal management program that opened under contract Aug. 31, 2024 (26 youth admitted so far, 15 from…