Orange County Homeless Deaths Nearly Quadruple Over Last Decade: Report

Deaths in the homeless population have sky-rocketed over the last decade in Orange County, California, primarily due to drug-related overdoses from fentanyl, according to a Feb. 27 report from county law enforcement.

In light of increasing homeless deaths in the region, Orange County Sheriff Don Barnes last year created the county’s first committee to analyze their numbers and causes.

The report released this week is the first from the committee.

According to the report, homeless deaths rose from 85 in 2010 to nearly 400 in 2021, the latest year included in the report, of which over 75 percent were drug-related, mostly involving fentanyl.

The majority of deaths—85 percent—were males.

“We continue to enhance efforts to address the fentanyl epidemic and provide critical resources to those trapped in addiction,” Barnes said in a statement accompanying the report’s release.

According to the report, homeless individuals also experienced a 100 percent increase in suicides and a near 270 percent increase in homicides, in which homeless individuals were murdered.

The report also found that, while homeless deaths had been increasing steadily, they spiked sharply at the start of the pandemic—by 55 percent—from 2019 to 2020.

The report also outlined possible solutions including legislation, increased substance abuse treatment programs, potential changes in sentencing laws to favor substance abuse treatment over jail time, and increased availability of naloxone, a drug often used to reverse opioid overdoses.