MAGOFFIN OD COUNT IS OFF, SHERIFF SAYS

MAGOFFIN COUNTY -- Magoffin Sheriff Pat Montgomery took issue with overdose
statistics provided last week by Coroner Johnny Lovely - a political foe
vying for the Democrat nomination for sheriff in the May 28 primary.

Referring to a story in the May 3 issue of the BSN, Montgomery - the
Republican incumbent seeking re-election, said Wednesday that he had done
some research of his own on the number of overdoses in Magoffin County over
a three-year period and his figures are a "hell of a long way from 42."

Lovely said last week that 42 residents had died in connection with
overdoses during his term as coroner.

Montgomery said he contacted the state Department of Public Health and an
official provided him with some figures that aren't even close to those
provided by Lovely. But that's not an unusual thing for the figures from
the state agency and local coroners to conflict, according to supervisor
George Robertson.

The sheriff said he was told that there was only one confirmed overdose in
1999, one alcohol-related OD and two other confirmed ODs in 2000; and two
in 2001.

Montgomery noted that the current number of overdoses for 2002 were not
available.

A spokesperson with the Department of Public Health told the BSN Wednesday
that the agency obtains information from death certificates, which are
filled out by coroners across the state. She said that the causes of death
are documented by the International Statistical Classification of Diseases,
which does not include the term "overdose."

George Robertson, a supervisor with the Department for Public Health, said
Thursday that the "numbers we get off death certificates is never close to
those reported" by officials in the news media. He also said that "we don't
have a term 'overdose...the term used is poisoning."

Robertson noted that he doesn't know why the figures rarely match and said
that the errors could be related to the tabulating system of documenting
death statistics.

Montgomery said Wednesday that the coroner is "not a pathologist" and that
there are 19 reasons when an autopsy must be performed when a body is
found. "I don't know where he is coming from," the sheriff said about the
coroner's figure of 42 overdoses in Magoffin County within a
three-and-a-half year period.

Lovely noted last week that "nothing's being done" to curb the number of
overdoses in Magoffin County, where there's been a 500 percent increase in
ODs over the last few years. There has been a string of suspected overdoses
in Magoffin County over the last few weeks.

Lovely said last week that there were eight overdose-related deaths during
the previous coroner's term. "And it's getting worse," he said. "You can
see it everyday."