The Obama administration announced $53 million in grants to help states fight the opioid abuse epidemic while also calling on Congress to allocate another $1. 1 billion toward the effort. From MedPage Today.
This article first appeared August 31, 2016 on MedPage Today
WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration announced $53 million in grants to help states fight the opioid abuse epidemic while also calling on Congress to allocate another $1. 1 billion toward the effort.
"These grants we're announcing today are an important step forward, and we hope Congress will take the next step," Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Sylvia Burwell said Tuesday on a conference call with reporters.
Michael Botticelli, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, agreed. "We can't end this crisis on our own," he said. "We need Congress to act on the president's $1.1 billion funding request so we can expand access to treatment and move our country from crisis to recovery. Every day that passes without Congressional action ... is a missed opportunity to save lives."
Much of the HHS grant money is aimed at each part of the agency's three-part strategy to fight the epidemic, Burwell explained. They included:
Reducing overprescribing. HHS is giving $11.5 million to 14 states to help them "ensure that healthcare professionals have the tools and information they need to make informed prescribing decisions and in the process help reduce overprescribing," she said. "States can use it to enhance prescription drug monitoring programs [PDMPs], to further prevention efforts like educating providers and patients about the risk of prescription drug overdosing, and to help health systems make informed decisions about prescribing pain medications."
Increasing access to treatment. The agency is providing $11 million to 11 states to expand access to medication-assisted treatment such as buprenorphine, Burwell said.
Ensuring access to naloxone. HHS is granting up to $11 million to 12 states to help more first responders obtain the overdose-reversal drug naloxone and to make sure they're trained in how to use it.
"By focusing on these three pillars .... we can help states, communities, and families push back even harder against the opioid epidemic in a way we know will lead to the best outcomes," Burwell said.
In addition to those funds, 21 states as well as four tribes will receive $9 million through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to strengthen drug abuse prevention efforts. Another $10 million will be awarded to help states better track and collect data on the epidemic as well as to develop more abuse prevention programs, HHS said in a press release.
Access to treatment is one area where more help is sorely needed, according to Steve Williams, mayor of Huntington, W.Va., who also participated in the conference call. Huntington is at the center of the epidemic, with 70 overdose deaths last year, although that number has dropped to 35 so far this year. "We only have 28 detox beds in the entire state of West Virginia," he said, including eight in Cabell County where Huntington is located.
On one particular evening a few weeks ago, there were 26 overdoses in Huntington; two of those patients died. "That evening ... we didn't have enough beds in the entire state if every person [overdosing] had said, 'I want help,'" said Williams. "Most times we find it's a 6-month waiting period before someone can get into treatment. When someone is begging for help, we don't have 6 months to give, or 6 weeks, or 6 days; we should have no less than 6 hours available to place somebody immediately into a treatment facility."
That's why the administration's $1.1 billion proposal -- of which around $920 million is to pay for access to treatment -- is so important, he continued. "This isn't a Democratic issue; it isn't a Republican issue; this is an issue of saving lives. ... This appropriation needs to be acted on by Congress immediately -- not waiting for a presidential election."
Changing the prescribing culture among providers is also critical to stopping the epidemic, according to Anne Schuchat, MD, principal deputy director of the CDC. "States that are funded through these grants will be able to do a number of things to help reinforce appropriate prescribing. One is strengthening PDMPs," she said. "Clinicians who are prescribing opiates should be able to easily access PDMPs and understand whether the patients they're caring for have recently filled prescriptions with another prescriber."