Swap funds or add services? Use of opioid settlement cash sparks strong disagreements

Apr 15 2024KFF Health News But instead of spending the money on new addiction treatment and prevention services they couldn't afford before, some jurisdictions are using it to replace existing funding and stretch tight budgets.

The national opioid settlements don't prohibit the use of money for initiatives already supported by other means. But families affected by addiction, recovery advocates, and legal and public health experts say doing so squanders a rare opportunity to direct additional resources toward saving lives. Paying staff salaries Scott County, Indiana — a small, rural place known nationally as the site of an HIV outbreak in 2015 sparked by intravenous drug use — received more than $570,000 in opioid settlement funds in 2022.

The Scott County Health Department did not respond to questions about how the funds typically allocated for salary were used instead. But at the public meeting, it was suggested they could be used at the department's discretion. "It can be played that it was just money used to buy an ambulance, but there's a lot more behind the scenes," Oleck said.

Related StoriesStucky, who is in recovery himself, asked Scott County for $300,000 in opioid settlement funds to hire three peer specialists and purchase a vehicle to transport people to treatment. He ultimately received one-sixth of that amount — enough to hire one person. Forfeited federal dollars Supplantation can take many forms, said Shelly Weizman, project director of the addiction and public policy initiative at Georgetown University's O'Neill Institute. Replacing general funds with opioid settlement dollars is an obvious one, but there are subtler approaches.

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