Quick Answer. The liver is an organ of the digestive system. The role of the digestive system is to transform food into necessary energy and to rid the body of solid waste. The liver functions within this system by producing bile and by filtering the blood from the digestive system.
The Times analysis of 2009 death statistics, the most recent available, showed: 1  For the first time ever in the US, more people were killed by drugs than motor vehicle accidents. 2  37,485 people died from drugs, a rate fueled by overdoses on prescription pain and anxiety medications, versus 36,284 from traffic accidents.
Ohio had the second-highest number of drug overdose deaths nationwide in 2014, a number that's soaring, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report released Friday. Heroin and prescription pain relievers took many of those 2,744 lives in Ohio. That's nearly one death every three hours last year. In Kentucky, there were more than 1,000 deaths. These grim totals placed both Ohio and Kentucky among the five states with the highest rates of drug overdose deaths as measured per 100,000 residents.