(The Center Square) – Los Angeles will be recognizing the homeless individuals that died before escaping the streets of the city. Dec. 21, the longest night of the year, marks the annual day of observance established by the National Coalition for the Homeless.
And, the homeless mortality rate in California has been growing with almost 2,000 homeless individuals dying in Los Angeles in the last year alone.
According to a County of Los Angeles public health report released earlier this year, the homeless death rate more than tripled between 2011 and 2022, but, the increasing of the homeless mortality rate has slowed. There was a stark difference between 2019 and 2022. From 2019 to 2021, the mortality rate rose 56% while from 2021 to 2022, it rose by only 2%.
“The recent plateau in the overall mortality rate can be attributed largely to a leveling off of the rate of drug overdose deaths, the leading cause of death among PEH for the past six years, and a sharp decline in COVID-19 mortality,” reads the report. “From 2021 to 2022, the distribution of doses of naloxone, an opioid overdose reversal medication, saw a two-and-a-half-fold increase in communities most affected by fentanyl overdoses, and the number of reported naloxone-induced overdose reversals nearly doubled. These efforts likely contributed to the rapid leveling-off of the overdose mortality rate in 2022.”