The Trump administration is providing states with $1.8 billion to fight the opioid crisis, the latest in a string of White House actions shaping the president’s messaging on healthcare ahead of the 2020 elections.
“We have all done a very good job,” Trump said at the White House of his administration’s work on the opioid crisis, predicting that the issue would become a “much more manageable and smaller problem.”
The grants announced Wednesday were appropriated by Congress. Half of the funding is being distributed to states through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, which will allow them to go to a variety of responses, whether they include youth prevention programs, employment training, distributing the opioid overdose antidote naloxone, or expanding telemedicine in rural areas so patients can reach addiction specialists.
This is the second year the Trump administration is overseeing the grants, and this round, the money cannot go to treatment facilities that do not use medication to help treat people who are addicted to opioids. The medications include drugs such as buprenorphine and Vivitrol, which help stave off severe withdrawal symptoms people have when they go off opioids.
To receive grants, the treatment facilities would also need to show that they have been able to connect patients with counseling, helped them to remain in treatment and to find housing, and have shown decreases in hospitalizations, a senior administration official told reporters.
Alex Azar, Health and Human Services secretary, said in a phone call with reporters that the latest specifications for treatment centers reflected his goal that “our work combating the opioid crisis has to follow the best science possible.”
The grants come from legislation to address the opioid crisis that Congress passed last year and that Trump signed into law. A total of $900 million of the funding over three years is going toward the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which tracks the opioid epidemic and how is it changing and provides advice to states, doctors, and patients about how to address public health issues. CDC will receive $301 million during the first year.
Kellyanne Conway, the senior counselor to the president, said in the phone call with reporters that the latest actions should be viewed as part of Trump’s overall healthcare reform strategy. She cited other examples, including the Trump administration’s goal to drastically reduce HIV transmission, and its goal to increase organ donations.
White House officials have been fighting back criticisms from Democrats who blast the Trump administration for siding with Republican states that asked the courts to invalidate Obamacare. Democrats say the healthcare law, which expanded coverage to 20 million people, including through providing Medicaid to the poor, is key to fighting the opioid crisis.
Last year, 47,590 people died from opioids, including heroin and fentanyl, its more potent cousin. The numbers reflected a decrease for the first time, by 2.8%, since the 1990s, but officials aren’t yet sure if that means the crisis has peaked or if the 2018 figures will be merely a blip in what turns out to be a continued increase in the death toll. Candidates who are running for the Democratic nomination to challenge Trump, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, have proposed spending $100 billion over a decade to fight the crisis.
In comparison, the Department of Health and Human Services by the end of 2019 will have allocated $9 billion in grants to states since Trump took office. In that time, 28% more people have been prescribed buprenorphine, and 31% fewer prescriptions have been written for opioid painkillers, which had been overprescribed beginning in the 1990s and led to the addiction and overdose crisis the U.S. currently faces.
“They are doing a great job locally when they get the funds,” Trump said of states and communities who get the grants. “They didn’t have the money, they didn’t have the funds, but some of these states have done an incredible job once they got the funds, and great results.”
The president has said that the opioid crisis is a top priority for his administration, and he has promised he will release a healthcare plan to replace Obamacare. While no details have yet emerged, officials have framed specific initiatives from the administration as part of the broader vision Trump has for healthcare.
On opioids, the president said he was pushing for the development of a painkiller that isn’t addictive and touted the first lady’s work bringing attention to babies that had been exposed to opioids while in the womb. He also noted the rollout of a media campaign that aimed to prevent young people from trying opioids.
While officials joined in with Trump to celebrate progress on the issue, they stressed they had to continue the initiatives they began.
“We all know the battle is just starting,” Dr. Brett Giroir, the assistant secretary for health at HHS, said at the White House. “We need to keep all the money flowing, we need to insist on evidence-based practices so patients and their families get the best evidence-based treatment.”
