The results of an annual statewide poll, released Tuesday morning, show that heroin use increased across the commonwealth last year — with Louisville and Northern Kentucky the hardest hit areas.

Three out of 10 Kentuckians surveyed last year said they know someone with problems due to abusing prescribed opioid painkillers, such as OxyContin, Vicodin, Percocet or codeine.

Nearly two out of 10 know someone with problems blamed on heroin use, according to the Kentucky Health Issues Poll.

Twenty-three percent of Louisville residents and 36 percent in Northern Kentucky said they had family members or friends who had problems resulting from heroin use, according to the poll, sponsored by Interact for Health and the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky.

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"The country and Kentucky, in particular, are facing an opioid epidemic that is truly shocking," the foundation's president and CEO Ben Chandler said in a news release Tuesday. "Kentuckians are seeing friends and family members struggle with addiction, and the increase in heroin use is particularly alarming."

Chandler pointed to the disturbing increase in overdose deaths in the state and nation.

"Experts estimate that as many as two million Americans are struggling with prescription drug addiction — with heroin and opioid overdoses claiming an average of 91 lives every day," U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday on the Senate floor, echoing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's online report "Understanding the Epidemic."

McConnell said that's why he helped pass the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act and the 21st Century Cures bill: to promote research and treatment to tackle the opioid crisis, which has resulted in more than half a million deaths from 200 to 2015.

Last year, 17 percent of Kentuckians surveyed said they knew someone impacted by heroin use, compared to 9 percent in 2013.

Prescription drug abuse, which had been as high as 33 percent in 2012, dropped to 27 percent in 2013 — the same percentage listed last year.

In Jefferson County, heroin and other opioids were blamed in at least 304 of last year's 362 known overdose deaths, according to a report issued in late March by the U.S. attorney's office. That's compared to causing or contributing to 218 of the 270 drug deaths just one year earlier.

Fewer residents in western and eastern Kentucky reported knowing someone impacted by heroin use, 9 percent and 16 percent respectively — compared to 23 percent in the Louisville area. But the two regions reported higher instances of methamphetamine use, with both at 21 percent.

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Fifteen percent of Louisvillians and 16 percent of Northern Kentucky residents acknowledged knowing someone who experienced problems due to meth use. Lexington reported about the same problem with heroin and meth, at 20 and 10 percent respectively — with pill abuse at 33 percent.

Eastern Kentucky led the state with more than one of every three residents surveyed knowing someone with problems from prescription drug abuse. In Louisville, it's slightly more than one of every four residents.

The study consisted of a random sample of 1,580 adults were interviewed by telephone by the Institute for Policy Research at the University of Cincinnati.

Reporter Beth Warren can be reached at (502) 582-7164 or bwarren@courier-journal.com.