Drugs with Most Death-Associated Reports
All tracked drugs ranked by FAERS reports where death was a reported outcome.
What This Ranking Tells Us
These rankings show drugs with the most FAERS reports where death was listed as an outcome. This data requires careful interpretation: a death report does not mean the drug caused the death. Patients on these medications are often critically ill with serious underlying conditions. Many commonly prescribed drugs appear because they are given to large, sick populations. Mortality rates per prescription would provide better safety signals but cannot be derived from FAERS data alone.
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Primary source: FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS). Supplementary labeling: FDA Drug Labels (SPL). These rankings are for informational purposes only and should not be used to make medical decisions.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a death report mean the drug killed someone?
No. A FAERS death report means someone died while taking or after taking a drug, but causation is not established. Patients taking these medications often have serious conditions (cancer, heart failure, autoimmune diseases) that independently carry high mortality. The drug may have been a coincidental factor.
Why do pain medications appear high on this list?
Opioid pain medications like oxycodone and fentanyl carry inherent overdose risks, and their reports often reflect actual drug-related deaths. But other drugs on the list — like blood thinners and chemotherapy agents — are prescribed to patients who are already at high risk of death from their underlying conditions.
Reading the Drugs with Most Death-Associated Reports
This table ranks all tracked drugs by death reports, sourced from FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS). The dataset is published by the relevant federal agency and updated as new reports and surveys come in. Each row links to a full drug profile so readers can move from headline number to the underlying FDA data — labeling, FAERS reports, recalls, pricing, and shortage status — that explains why a particular drug sits where it does.
These rankings show drugs with the most FAERS reports where death was listed as an outcome. This data requires careful interpretation: a death report does not mean the drug caused the death. Patients on these medications are often critically ill with serious underlying conditions. Many commonly prescribed drugs appear because they are given to large, sick populations. Mortality rates per prescription would provide better safety signals but cannot be derived from FAERS data alone.
Rankings are diagnostic, not prescriptive. Absolute numbers are shaped by exposure volume, reporting practices, and data-collection methodology, so a drug near the top is not automatically "worse" than a drug near the bottom — it may simply be older, more widely prescribed, or manufactured by firms with more visible reporting. Context from FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS) updates continuously, which means the relative order here can change from one refresh to the next. Rankings on this page are for educational research only and must not be used as a substitute for medical advice from a licensed clinician.
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Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.