Pa. officials: Funding building up, stigma persists in opioid addiction crisis

Dec. 16—Nearly 300 people die daily in the U.S. from an accidental drug overdose.

"That's a jetliner a day," Rep. Madeleine Dean of Pennsylvania's 4th Congressional District said during a Friday roundtable discussion on opioid addiction.

The overdose crisis continues throughout the country even as it has seemingly been pushed out of the limelight. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates nearly 108,000 people died of a drug overdose in the U.S. in the 12 months ending in July.

The estimated count in Pennsylvania during that period exceeds 5,000. The 12-month rolling estimate hasn't dipped below that number since May 2020.

Federal and state elected officials, medical professionals and Pennsylvania's top drug and alcohol executive hosted a virtual chat about efforts to specifically address opioid addiction and recovery.

Funding from the American Rescue Plan in addition to multi-billion dollar settlements from pharmaceutical companies will help expand access to addiction treatment and wraparound services such as help finding housing or work, panelists said. However, they bemoaned how stigma persists as a barrier for some wishing to seek treatment.

Dean said her middle child, son Harry, achieved 10 years in recovery this year and now works in addiction treatment helping others — a theme in the field of recovery. She recalled driving him to a treatment center and him having said he never asked for help because there was always something going on: Birthdays, holidays, etc. He also expressed that he felt the shame of confessing his struggles outweighed even death.

"What I now recognize is that there is no good time (to ask for help). Just ask," Dean said.

Pennsylvania State Sen. Art Haywood, who represents parts of Montgomery and Philadelphia counties, noted that the commonwealth has $100 million in funding from the American Rescue Plan. The Legislature included the funds in the current budget. Though an appointed panel made its recommendations, state lawmakers haven't agreed on how it will be spent.

"Our core challenge is getting the services to individuals and that means we've got to pay for them," Haywood said, citing mental health treatment and recovery homes as examples of what's needed.

The American Rescue Plan dedicated about $5 billion nationwide to expand access to mental health and substance use treatments. That's in addition to more than $54 billion obtained through settlements with the pharmaceutical industry for its role in over-prescribing painkillers, blamed as a root cause of the opioid crisis.

Attorney General Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania's governor-elect, announced this week that the commonwealth will receive more than $450 million from CVS and Walgreens with more to come from companies including Walmart. About $2.2 billion total is earmarked for Pennsylvania through multiple settlements. The funding will be dispersed over 10 to 15 years or more in many cases.

According to Jen Smith, secretary, Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs, about 70 percent of funding from the settlements will be sent directly to county-level programs. An additional 15% will go to municipalities that dropped their own lawsuits to allow a statewide pursuit of settlements, she said, while the remainder will be allocated by state lawmakers.

Funding from the American Rescue Plan must be used on services and equipment, Smith said. The settlement funding, however, can be used to build or expand facilities. She added that several counties are looking at launching brand new crisis units with staff and services.

The Pennsylvania Legislature enacted four new laws in 2022 addressing opioid addiction.

Good Samaritan protections were expanded for the use of life-saving overdose reversal medications beyond the one commonly used for opioids, naloxone. Drug treatment facilities are now barred from denying entry solely on the basis of a negative drug test, expanding access at facilities that had required positive tests.

State police will be required to log drug overdose incidents directly into a new mapping system allowing an immediate mobilization of services when sudden spikes are detected.

And, the possession of fentanyl test strips is now legal.

The highly potent and deadly fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, and related analogues are blamed for 3 of 4 accidental drug overdoses. Its presence isn't always known as drug traffickers have been found to cut it into other illegal narcotics or counterfeit pharmaceuticals.

The strips, which retail for about $1, can detect fentanyl in a particular substance. They don't determine potency. Harm reduction advocates say the strips save lives and buy people time to potentially seek recovery.

State Rep. James Struzzi, R-Indiana, first introduced the measure in 2019 and reintroduced it in 2021. He was inspired by the loss of his brother, Michael, who died of a fatal drug overdose in 2014.

"I think the biggest factor for a lot of people is that they don't see a way out," Struzzi said of potential roadblocks to recovery.