Drug & Alcohol Rehab For Covington, Indiana

Covington is a small city near the western border of Indiana, roughly thirteen miles east of Danville, Illinois. It serves as the seat of Fountain County, one of the smallest counties (by population) in the state of Indiana. Despite its small size, Covington is known for its annual Apple Festival, which takes place around the main square every fall. Many people who travel through western Indiana or even eastern Illinois will know it as a popular stopping-off point along Highway 74.

As of the latest census data, Covington has a population of just 2,733. The city and the rest of the county enjoy a relatively low cost of living and high wages. The median household income in Fountain County is $62,526 per year. While this falls well below the state median ($70,051), it’s still higher than many rural and semi-rural areas throughout the state. The poverty rate in Fountain County is just 10.6%, which is lower than Indiana’s poverty rate of 12.3%. [1]

Though Covington is a sleepy little city that welcomes travelers and has a fun, cozy culture all its own, there’s a dark cloud that has hung over the citizens for many years: substance abuse. Addiction is on the rise throughout many cities in Indiana, including Covington. Based on the most recent data, alcohol and marijuana are the most commonly abused substances in Covington, Indiana. The city also sees the abuse of other addictive substances, such as meth, prescription opioids, cocaine, and heroin.

Continue reading to learn about substance abuse and addiction in Covington, Indiana. And remember, if you or a loved one is fighting addiction in Covington or the surrounding area, you can always reach out to Addiction Rehab Centers for help.

Drug and Alcohol Addiction in Covington

Nearly all cities in Indiana delegate their substance abuse data collection to their parent county, and the city of Covington is no exception. Fountain County collects substance abuse case data, including arrests involving addictive substances, overdoses, and fatal overdoses, from all towns, cities, and census-designated areas within its borders.

In doing so, Fountain County combines all the data from different municipalities, making it more challenging to identify how many cases originate in different cities. That said, Covington is the second most populous city in the county (just behind Attica), accounting for 16.3% of the county population. By some estimates, Covington may contribute as much as 25% (or 1 out of every 4) substance abuse cases to the figures recorded in Fountain County. For this reason, we evaluate the available county-level data to get a better understanding of the ongoing substance abuse crisis in the city of Covington.

Thankfully, fatal overdoses in Covington and the rest of Fountain County are few. There has been some fluctuation from year to year, but deaths are less common in the area, mostly due to the small population size. The table below shows how deaths involving all drugs (including alcohol) have changed in the county over the past few years. [2]

*Data for 2023 and 2024 is provisional and may be subject to change. The last date that data was collected was 05/21/2025.

Based on the available data, fatal overdoses in Fountain County have followed a similar trajectory to fatal overdoses recorded in many other Indiana counties. The figures increased leading up to and during the COVID-19 pandemic, before declining toward the end of 2022.

While there are relatively few fatal overdoses each year in Fountain County compared to larger counties in western Indiana, they are actually somewhat high for a county with such a small population. Fortunately, the data appears to show fatal overdoses declining to their pre-pandemic levels in more recent years. However, it’s important to point out that the data for 2023 is still provisional (despite it being finalized in many other counties), and the data for 2024 has yet to be released by the Fountain County.

Every county we’ve examined in Indiana has recorded much higher figures for non-fatal overdoses than for fatal overdoses. This is not just true for Indiana, either. Non-fatal overdoses are more common in general, and this actually makes them a better measurement for the severity of a substance abuse crisis in a given city or county.

Additionally, non-fatal overdoses tend to reflect more accurate data recording. This is because these numbers are collected via well-documented hospital discharges and emergency department visits involving addictive substances. The table below shows the relevant overdose data in Fountain County between 2016 and 2024: [3]

*Data for 2023 and 2024 is provisional and may be subject to change. The last date that data was collected was 05/21/2025.

Technically, non-fatal overdoses declined between 2016 and 2022 (the most recent year with finalized data) by 23%. However, this doesn’t account for the years in between, which saw some of the highest numbers of the entire dataset. For example, between 2017 and 2021, only one year recorded fewer than 40 non-fatal overdoses, and 3 years recorded non-fatal overdoses at or above 44.

While non-fatal overdoses peaked in 2021, they have since declined. Once again, however, the data for 2023 and 2024 is still provisional. Thankfully, the number of fatal overdoses does appear to be in decline from the peaks reached during the COVID-19 pandemic.

We can’t just look at these numbers in a vacuum, though. We must consider the relationship between fatal overdoses, non-fatal overdoses, and total overdoses (fatal plus non-fatal). In 2016, there were 42 total overdoses on record in Fountain County. 3 of these overdoses were fatal, accounting for 7.1% of all overdoses. By 2022, there were 33 total overdoses on record. Again, 3 of these overdoses were fatal, but this time, those 3 account for 9% of the total. This isn’t a substantial change, especially given the small dataset for fatal overdoses, but it could indicate that the rate of fatalities caused by addiction is on the rise.

Types of Substance Abuse in Covington

In 2023 and 2024, alcohol and marijuana were the most abused substances in Fountain County. Historically, alcohol has been one of the most abused substances statewide, even though its prevalence has declined in recent years, with drugs like marijuana, crystal meth, and opioids seeing a spike in prevalence and abuse.

The only caveat is that analyzing the abuse of specific substances, particularly illicit substances, is not easy. We must examine arrest and re-arrest records involving these substances, but this data does not account for abuse by individuals who are not breaking any laws or have managed to evade arrest while abusing drugs and alcohol.

In any case, here is the latest data from Indiana’s Next Level Recovery program showing the arrests involving different kinds of addictive substances between 2016 and 2024 in Fountain County:

*Statistics for 2023 and 2024 are still preliminary and do not account for the entire calendar year(s).

Though total arrests in Fountain County increased between 2016 and 2018, they have since declined in most years thereafter. 2022 recorded just 102 arrests, and, even though the data is provisional for 2023, only 101 arrests were recorded the next year. However, the total arrests have increased by nearly 25% in 2024, and the data is still provisional, so we might see that number go up even further in the near future.

When examining individual substances, it’s clear that people struggling with addiction in Fountain County most often gravitate toward alcohol, marijuana, and meth. Since total arrests have declined since 2016, the number of arrests involving each of these substances has gone down as well. Arrests involving cocaine and prescription opioids are relatively uncommon in Fountain County, while arrests involving drug paraphernalia (most often associated with meth or heroin abuse) used to be far more common, but have declined rapidly over the past few years.