As Erie County continues to address the ongoing opioid epidemic, they're now seeing a new trend, with an increase of cocaine-related overdose deaths.

"In 2016, 23 percent of our 325 drug overdose deaths were with cocaine and then fast forward to 2018, of the confirmed 230 drug overdose deaths, 37 percent had a positive toxicology screen for cocaine so we're seeing an increasing trend," said Dr. Gale Burstein, the Erie County health commissioner.

As a stimulant, cocaine increases the heart rate and blood pressure, but it also causes narrowing of blood vessels and can lead to heart failure.

"People think of cocaine as a party drug and they don't really think about the risks, but cocaine can have some very serious effects and actually can result in death as we're seeing with these numbers," said Burstein.

As the health department has seen before, different drugs being sold are mixed together, whether it's fentanyl mixed with heroin or cannabis. 

But Burstein says now they're even seeing it be mixed with cocaine.

"The problem is that people may not know what they're buying, if they believe it could have fentanyl in it and so they're probably not expecting it, so they're probably not prepared with Narcan on site because they think, ‘oh I'm using a stimulant, I don't need Narcan,’ so unfortunately nothing is safe," said Burstein.

And while they might be seeing an increase in cocaine-related deaths, they've seen a decrease in opioid-related deaths, with 251 in 2017, down to 186 in 2018.

Burstein says while there isn't any FDA-approved medication to treat cocaine addiction, anyone can call the Erie County addiction hotline at 716-831-7007 to seek treatment.