<html><head></head><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, sans-serif;font-size:13px"><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11892" dir="ltr"><span id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12189">I can come up with a couple of possibilities. First, that some of the opioid deaths are counted in other causes of death to get to the 2% number. The second, is that there is another category of opioids beyond the "heroin", "natural & semi synthetic, inc. oxycodone", "synthetic, inc. fentanyl", and "methadone" buckets, where the decrease was less than 2% (i.e. an increase or a decrease between 0 and 2% but a high n).</span></div><div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12609"><span id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12189"><br></span></div><div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12624"><span id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12189">Brent</span></div><div class="qtdSeparateBR" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11891"><br><br></div><div class="yahoo_quoted" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11856" style="display: block;"> <div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11855"> <div style="font-family: HelveticaNeue, Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11854"> <div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11853"> <font id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11887" size="2" face="Arial"> <hr id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12252" size="1"> <b><span style="font-weight:bold;">From:</span></b> Robert Holmes <robert@robertholmes.org><br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com> <br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Wednesday, January 2, 2019 12:16 PM<br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b> [FRIAM] Statistical poser (aka fact checking is hard)<br> </font> </div> <div class="y_msg_container" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11859"><br><div id="yiv6494991778"><div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11933">Early this week I came across a recent press release from NM Dept of Health: <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="https://nmhealth.org/news/information/2018/12/?view=728" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12231">"Governor Martinez Announces Continued Improvement in Drug Overdose Death Rankings"</a>. I've been tinkering round with opioid statistics, so thought it might be worth fact checking the release. The results were… interesting. If nothing else they've shown me how difficult it must be to communicate public health statistics.<br><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11934"><br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11948">So here are some of the key figures from the release:</div><ul id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11936"><li id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11935">New Mexico’s national ranking has improved from the second highest death drug overdose death rate in the United States in 2014 to 17th highest in 2017<br></li><li id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11937">New Mexico previously reported a 4 percent decline in death rates in 2017 due to overdose of commonly prescribed opioids such as oxycodone compared to 2016. In addition, deaths due to heroin decreased by 9 percent and deaths due to synthetic opioids such as fentanyl decreased by 6 percent over the same time period.<br></li></ul><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11938">The first of these claims passed my sniff test: I know NM's ranking has been improving, even though individual counties rank the wort in the nation. And sure enough, if you pull<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="https://wonder.cdc.gov/mcd.html" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_11939"> the underlying CDC data</a> you can confirm these exact numbers (ignoring DC).</div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12187"><br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12188">The second claim is the one that gave me pause. Those reductions in individual opioids look kinda high. Yes, NM's ranking is improving but it's because our rate is essentially stable while other states rocket past. And when I check the above CDC data, yes the reduction in death rate appears to be about 2%</div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12209"><br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12208">So there's the poser: if NM's reduction in opioid deaths (2016-2017) is 2%, how can this be consistent with individual opioid reductions of 9% (heroin), 4% (natural & semi synthetic, inc. oxycodone), and 6% (synthetic, inc. fentanyl)?</div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12207"><br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12205">—Robert</div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12206"><br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1546449285824_12210">P.S. I'll post my best guess later. Oh, and it's not that they omitted methadone: deaths due to that are down 19% in the same period.</div></div></div>============================================================<br>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv<br>Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College<br>to unsubscribe <a href="http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com" target="_blank">http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com</a><br>archives back to 2003: <a href="http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/" target="_blank">http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/</a><br>FRIAM-COMIC <a href="http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ </a>by Dr. Strangelove<br><br><br></div> </div> </div> </div></div></body></html>