County medical examiner says 2016 set record for overdose deaths in La Crosse

Candahl said dept. averages 150 scene calls per year.

A county medical examiner has a thankless job.  

La Crosse County’s examiner, Tim Candahl, gave that impression when he reported on the activities of his office in the past year.

Candahl told a county board committee that his department averages 150 scene calls a year, to investigate a cause of death.

Candahl says those scenes often have some of the worst things “you could possibly see.”

Candahl also talked about how the drug epidemic isn’t slowing down.

In 2016, the county reportedly set a record at 26 for number of overdose deaths during a calendar year.

“(That) kind of goes with the trend that the DAs seeing and what we’re seeing when there’s an accidentally overdose or an intentional overdoes,” Candahl said, adding that suicides have gone down in the county.

Candahl also reported that increases in death investigations and cremations were also growing trends. The county had 777 cremations in 2015 and 868 last year.