Bay Area // San Francisco
May 20, 2023Updated: May 20, 2023 10:07 am
A man died late Friday at the Civic Center BART station from a possible drug overdose, authorities said, although the coroner has yet to determine an official cause of death.
Bill Hutchinson/The Chronicle
A man died late Friday of a possible drug overdose on the BART platform at Civic Center Station in San Francisco, authorities said.
The report of a possible overdose came just before midnight, BART spokeswoman Cheryl Stalter said. Officials and medical staff were unable to revive the man.
Stalter said it was up to the coroner to determine the cause of death, but drug paraphernalia were found near the man and there was no suspicion of a crime.
A Twitter user described the incident in a post just before 12:30 p.m. Saturday.
“A young man just overdosed and died on the BART platform in the Civic Center,” the person wrote, addressing San Francisco’s board of directors and Mayor London Breed. “When is enough ENOUGH?! Guarding a body while waiting for EMS was not the way I wanted to end my work evening. RIP, young man.”
Preliminary data shows that 268 people died from overdoses in San Francisco in April — a number that puts the city on track to record more than 800 overdose deaths by the end of the year. In 2022, there were 647 drug overdose deaths in the city.
The overdose epidemic was largely caused by the synthetic opioid fentanyl, which is 50 times more potent than heroin.
Reach Danielle Echeverria: [email protected]; Twitter: @DanielleEchev
Danielle Echeverria is a reporter for The Chronicle’s engagement and breaking news team. She recently completed her master’s degree in journalism at Stanford University, where she won the Nicholas Roosevelt Environmental Journalism Award for her reporting on agriculture, climate change and occupational safety. Previously she did an internship at The Chronicle in the economics department as well as at Big Local News with a focus on data journalism. She is originally from Bakersfield, California.