Around New England

Overdose Deaths Up 200 Percent in Attleboro

March 14, 2018

Thirty-nine people died of drug overdoses — most from opioids — in Attleboro, Massachusetts in 2017, which is a 200 percent increase from 2016, according to Attleboro police.

About 72 percent of the victims were men and almost all were white, while the largest group were between the ages of 25 and 34, according to The Sun Chronicle, of Attleboro.

Attleboro is a city of about 44,000 people on the Rhode Island border. Its economically depressed downtown is a hotspot of opioid overdoses, police said.

The findings in Attleboro bucked a statewide trend. Massachusetts saw an 8.3 percent decrease in opioid deaths in 2017, at 1,977, as opposed to 2,155 in 2016.