NEW YORK (AP) — Smoking has surpassed injecting as the most common way of taking drugs in U.S. overdose deaths, a new government study suggests. CDC officials decided to study the topic after seeing reports from California suggesting that smoking fentanyl was becoming more common than injecting it. Potent, illicit versions of the painkiller are involved in more U.S. overdose deaths than any other drug. But “both injection and smoking carry a substantial overdose risk,” and it’s not yet clear if a shift toward smoking fentanyl reduces U.S. overdose deaths, said Tanz, a CDC scientist who studies overdoses. It’s complicated to map out exact percentages of deaths that occurred after smoking, injecting, snorting or swallowing drugs, experts say.

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Persons: Lauren Tanz, Tanz, it's, Alex Karl, Kral, ‘, snorting, ” Organizations: Disease Control, CDC, RTI, District of Columbia, West, Associated Press Health, Science Department, Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science, Educational Media Group, AP Locations: California, U.S, San Francisco, Northeast