Drug overdoses, COVID-19 and organ damage from alcohol were the biggest culprits behind the still-elevated number of deaths since the pandemic.
Paramedics bring a patient into the Emergency Department at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital in Aurora on March 13, 2023. Fewer Coloradans died in 2023 than in the previous year, but the state still lost more people than it did before the pandemic.
Deaths from major natural causes dropped in 2021 and stabilized in 2022, though in most cases they remained above pre-pandemic levels. Last year was the first time since the pandemic began that most major causes of death had lower rates than in 2019, though the increase in overdoses overshadowed that improvement.
In 2022, COVID-19 had been the fifth-largest cause of death in Colorado, but last year, it dropped out of the top 10. The state health department recorded 626 deaths from the virus in 2023, compared to 2,261 in 2022, when the state was coping with the tail end of the first wave of the omicron variant.
Stroke deaths were up slightly compared to the previous year and before the pandemic, while unintentional overdoses increased significantly. Chronic liver disease deaths were up compared to 2019, but down slightly from their high in 2022. Death rates decreased from 2022 to 2023 for all age groups except infants and youth between 15 and 18. Compared to 2019, however, mortality rates were up for all groups except infants.
The rate of Colorado’s overdose deaths had decreased slightly in 2022, raising hopes that the worst of the opioid epidemic might be over. The 2023 numbers, which showed overdoses increasing about 3%, dashed those hopes.
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