Washington [US], May 11 (ANI/Sputnik): The number of US citizens killed by drug overdoses soared to more than 107,000 last year, the highest figure ever recorded, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a new report issued on Wednesday.

The death toll shot up by 15% to 107,600 in 2021, a rise of almost 14,000 over the 93,655 in 2020, the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) said in the report.

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The death toll in the first year of the Biden administration continued a worrisome trend from the last year of the presidency of Donald Trump. The previous year, 2020, drug overdose deaths grew by 30% compared to 2019, the CDC's figures said.

More than 70% of the drug overdose deaths were caused by a single substance, fentanyl, which was the fatal agent in 71,238 cases, the CDC said. (ANI/Sputnik)

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