WaPo article: ‘Cries for help’: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/07/01/coronavirus-drug-overdose/

“Nationwide, federal and local officials are reporting alarming spikes in drug overdoses — a hidden epidemic within the coronavirus pandemic. Emerging evidence suggests that the continued isolation, economic devastation and disruptions to the drug trade in recent months are fueling the surge”

“If it weren’t for covid, these opioid deaths are all we’d be talking about right now,” said Natalia Derevyanny, spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office in Cook County, Ill., which includes Chicago.