By Tom Davis 

Each year, Patch takes a look at the 30 communities that have the highest number of heroin treatment cases statewide from the most recent year available (see list below).

For many New Jersey counties, heroin abuse remains a major factor in a steep increase in drug abuse cases in recent years — particularly in Ocean County, where the number of overdoses has more than doubled in recent years.

Indeed, Ocean County had the most towns — nine — on the list of 30 towns based on the state's newly recent data derived from 2016 statistics. Three were from Middlesex — including the small borough of Middlesex and the large township of Woodbridge, which had a 75 percent increase in cases between 2015 and 2016.

Once again, state statistics show how the drug not only infested New Jersey’s urban areas but also the more unlikely places where suburban stories of abuse have developed into a sad, profound narrative: Brick, Lower Township, Millville and Berkeley Township.

The statistics were recently released from the Division of Mental Health and Addiction Services in the New Jersey Department of Human Services, and they're based on the number of people seeking treatment for heroin abuse.

Some communities have had decreases in recent years. But the majority of communities saw their heroin treatment cases go up, showing that the heroin scourge is not confined to the urban communities anymore.

Here is the list — scroll to view the towns: