Report: Overdoses are causing more deaths among pregnant women

Accidental overdose was the top killer of Louisiana’s pregnant women as the world grappled with the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, according to a new report released this month by the state’s Pregnancy-Associated Mortality Review. The federally funded committee found that 82 pregnant or recently pregnant women died in 2020. That’s an increase of over 40% from the three years prior, when the average ratio of pregnancy-associated deaths was about 101.5 per 100,000 births. In 2020, that ratio jumped to 143.3 per 100,000 births. Each year, the committee of health professionals...