More people in Montgomery County are passing away of heroin overdoses than homicides. There were than 450 heroin related overdoses in Maryland last year. Anne Arundel’s county executive Steve Schuh is now declaring it a public health emergency. According to Kathy Rebbert-Franklin with Maryland’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, there has been an almost doubling of heroin deaths between 2010 and 2013. Baltimore County, followed by Anne Arundel and Prince George are the counties that were hit the hardest. There were over 300 overdoses last year alone, with one fatality a week. Schuh also announced the creation of an Action Task Force with the goal of increasing the availability of treatment for residents, the availability of an overdose reversal drug, and to increase public education effort.
