Boston Indicators brief explores sharp drop in Massachusetts overdose deaths, warns funding and eligibility cuts could reverse trend
October 15, 2026
Boston – New research from Boston Indicators, the research center at the Boston Foundation, explores the notable drop in opioid overdose deaths in 2025, but suggests that the recent decline could reverse in the face of federal funding cuts to addiction-related treatments, programs and services. The new research brief, Declining Opioid Overdose Deaths in Massachusetts: Drivers, Risks, and What Comes Next, shows that Massachusetts’ opioid overdose rates, which have been among the highest in the nation in recent years, have fallen by nearly 60 percent since peaking in 2022.
The brief notes that the sharp decline has been broad-based across racial, ethnic, and age groups, with death rates falling by 56 percent for Whites, 57 percent for Latinos, 68 percent for Blacks, and 73 percent for AAPI residents, just since 2022.
“We are still witnessing too many overdose deaths in the state, but the new data are encouraging after a decade that featured historically high overdose death rates,” said Luc Schuster, Executive Director of Boston Indicators. “We must also be aware that some of the biggest drivers of the decline, including the wider availability of overdose treatments and programs, require constant investment and vigilance to continue this important trend.”
The brief highlights three possible driving factors behind the recent sharp decline noted in a Massachusetts Department of Public Health report: changes in the drug supply and improved monitoring; a reduction in the pool of people at risk of fatal overdose; and expanded access to harm reduction and treatment, especially the expanded availability of naloxone to reverse dangerous overdoses.
Whether those driving factors and the recent decline can be maintained depends largely on sustaining investments in public health that the Trump administration has threatened to cut. Changes in Medicaid eligibility and new Medicaid work requirements under the 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill Act, for example, could lead to thousands of Medicaid-enrolled adults in Massachusetts diagnosed with opioid use disorder (OUD) losing health coverage through inability to keep up with eligibility requirements or difficulty meeting new work requirements. If that loss of Medicaid leads to losing medication for managing OUD, research shows that people are six times more likely to die in the four weeks after they stop treatment.
Proposed cuts to federal agencies that administer substance abuse and mental health grants and other funding also weaken the ability to allocate resources to where they are most needed, and prohibitions on federal funds being used on substance test kits and other harm reduction supplies also have safety impacts. The Trump administration has also moved to cut funding and staff for government agencies in charge of data collection and overdose surveillance.