A new survey suggests illicit opioid use is much more common than the government's numbers indicate

A new survey of American adults suggests illicit opioid use in the United States is much more common than the government's numbers indicate.

In the survey, 7.5 percent of respondents reported they had used (or might have used) illicitly manufactured fentanyl ( IMF ) in the previous 12 months , 25 times the rate suggested by the government-sponsored National Survey on Drug Use and Health .

"Synthetic opioids," the category that includes fentanyl, were implicated in about 65,000 U.S. deaths in 2024 .

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that fentanyl use is implicated in 65,500 deaths.

A survey by Respondi found that 0.2 percent of Americans 12 or older were past-year fentanyl users in 2023 .