Crocker Stephenson

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Twenty people have died of probable heroin overdoses in Milwaukee County during the past two weeks, a toll the county medical examiner's office on Thursday called "unprecedented."

The county typically averages one heroin death every three days, the office said. The medical examiner is investigating the possibility that other drugs, such as fentanyl, played a role in the deaths.

Fentanyl is a synthetic opiate similar to morphine, but it can be 40 to 50 times more powerful than street heroin. It is particularly deadly when mixed with other drugs.

Graphic: Milwaukee County fentanyl deaths

As of July 1st, 39 people died in Milwaukee County from fentanyl-related overdoses, nine more fentanyl deaths than during all of 2015 — which was itself a record.

Heroin-related deaths also continue to rise, according to the medical examiner's office. There have been 61 deaths so far this year, compared with 110 in 2015.

The total number of drug-related deaths so far this year is 143, compared with a record 255 deaths in 2015.

"We tend to overuse words such as 'unprecedented' and 'horrific,' but the death and destruction connected to heroin and opioids is indeed unprecedented and horrific," Chuck Rosenberg, acting administrator of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, said earlier this summer.

"The problem is enormous and growing, and all of our citizens need to wake up to these facts," he said.

According to medical examiner's reports, Milwaukee County's latest spike in drug deaths began July 27, around 8 a.m., when the body of a 48-year-old Illinois man was found seated upright on a couch of a friend's house in Brown Deer.

A few hours later, the body of a 60-year-old man was found in the bedroom of his Milwaukee home.

In the days that followed, the body of a 27-year-old woman would be found in a south side alley; the body of a 61-year-old man would be found seated in his living room with a plate of food on his lap; a 35-year-old woman would be found by her daughter on a bed cluttered with drug paraphernalia.

Three people died on Aug. 6 alone: the body of a 37-year-old man was found in a gas station bathroom around 1 p.m.; the body of a 46-year-old homeless man was found seated in a chair at a transitional living center around 3 p.m.; and around 7 p.m., a 48-year-old man who struggled with back pain died at a hospital, where he tested positive for methadone, amphetamines and Oxycodone.

All the deaths since July 27 remain under investigation.