72% of the dead are male — one of many gender gaps media and politicians don’t speak of
Reporters at KIRO 7 News recently interviewed King County Councilmember Reagan Dunn about the Don’t Count Us Out campaign, which aims to reduce the stigma around drug and alcohol addiction and recovery. During the interview there was no acknowledgment that drugs and alcohol are more than twice as likely to kill our sons than our daughters.
Here are the numbers KIRO 7 showed, which come from the King County Medical Examiner’s Office.
The Fatal Overdose Data Dashboard maintained by the Medical Examiner’s Office shows that 72% of the 686 people with a confirmed drug or alcohol-caused death in 2021 were male. This gender gap has been widening over the last ten years, with the percentage in 2012 having been 62%. The table below lays out the numbers.
What should they be saying?
The sex-based disparity in deaths caused by drug and alcohol abuse is one of the gender gaps that government officials and news media typically neglect. Might the reason be that we think it’s normal? Isn’t it kind of…natural? The way it’s always been and always will be? This is one of the gender gaps that’s ok, right?
“Drug overdose deaths have been skyrocketing around Washington and nationwide.”
– KIRO 7
Not only was the KIRO 7 News segment silent about drugs taking so many more male lives. So too is King County’s press release about the Don’t Count Us Out campaign, as is the campaign’s website.
For another example, consider the KING 5 News article “Fentanyl overdose deaths on track to set grim record in Washington“. Despite the article being about trends in fentanyl overdose deaths, it doesn’t mention that men are more than twice as likely as women to succumb to the drug. The article quotes an addiction prevention supervisor with Youth Eastside Services who says, “In terms of trends of who is using, I would say the trend is everybody. The trend is there is no trend.” Actually there is a clear sex-based trend.
Wouldn’t it represent progress toward gender equality and gender equity if members of the media and government officials more often uttered words like “Data demonstrate that this problem is disproportionately harming men”?
The social malady of people dying from consuming drugs and alcohol should be considered within the broader context of so-called deaths of despair, which include suicides.
See related: Reporting by Washington State Department of Health Neglects Gender Gap in Drug Overdose Deaths and Only 16% of Washington’s Social Workers are Male – and It’s a Real Problem