Public health officials here say the spike is being driven primarily by prescription opioids — painkillers like oxycodone, morphine and methadone — whose sales in the state rose 131 percent during the same period. In New Mexico, the overdose death rate from prescription drugs now outstrips that from illegal drugs, the report found.

Over the last decade, deaths from prescription drug overdoses have risen to unprecedented levels throughout the country, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But medical experts and drug treatment advocates say the problem has become especially pronounced here, where resources have long been focused on other problems. In November, a report from the C.D.C. found that New Mexico had the nation’s highest overall drug overdose death rate.

“As the availability of prescription opioids have increased in New Mexico, so has the overdose death rate. It’s added a new layer to what we have to deal with,” said Dr. Michael Landen, the deputy state epidemiologist. “It’s also a new population that is involved with prescription-drug deaths. It’s much broader.”

Prescription opioid addiction in New Mexico has carved through racial and economic barriers over the past few years, in Albuquerque from the dusty streets of the South Valley to the neatly pruned homes of Northeast Heights.