[W]ASHINGTON — As the opiate addiction crisis plays out in communities in Vermont and across the nation, the issue has become increasingly prominent on the federal stage.
President Donald Trump created a commission earlier this year, headed by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, to make recommendations about how to stem opiate abuse.
In an interim report issued in July, the commission urged Trump to declare a national emergency.
“With approximately 142 Americans dying every day, America is enduring a death toll equal to September 11th every three weeks,” the commission wrote.
The report recommended increasing treatment capacity, training for doctors who prescribe painkillers, and broader access to medication assisted treatment and the overdose-reversing drug naloxone.
Shortly after the report came out, Trump said he would declare a national emergency, but the president has not yet taken action.
Some in Congress have grown frustrated.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., at an appropriations hearing in September, said the federal government is not spending enough to combat the crisis.
“This is not going away, and if this is a national emergency we need to start treating it like that,” Shaheen said.
But with no action at the federal level, Vermont officials are focused on implementing state initiatives.
Dr. Mark Levine, commissioner of the Department of Health, said Vermont has already implemented many of the recommended policy changes in the commission’s interim report — such as public education about opioid prescriptions and better public access to naloxone.
Federal funding is already supporting treatment, recovery and prevention efforts, Levine said. But it’s not enough to combat the problem. Vermont officials, for example, want to use Medicare to cover medication assisted treatment for people 65 and up who have become addicted.
“I can candidly say, even though with a crisis of this proportion it is accurate to say there is never enough money, we are certainly getting substantial amounts of money for those afflicted with opioid use disorder,” Levine said.
Nick Szubiak, a policy expert at the National Council for Behavioral Health, said federal responses to the opioid crisis, like the commission headed by Christie, are important because they can help set standards and best practices.
Vermont’s response to the opioid epidemic is “progressive,” he said. In other states, access to substance abuse treatment is inconsistent.
“Across the country there’s so much variability, and it differs tremendously,” Szubiak said.
Szubiak said collaboration on local, state and federal levels is a positive step.
But substance abuse prevention and treatment programs have been underfunded, he said.
“This is great that we’re seeing a lot of visibility from the federal government, but we also need to make sure that when these laws are passed they get the funding that they need,” Szubiak said.
Meanwhile, states are taking the lead on investigating whether pharmaceutical companies should bear any responsibility for the crisis.
Earlier this year, Vermont Attorney General TJ Donovan joined a coalition of state attorneys general that is investigating opioid manufacturers and distributors. Last week, the 41 members of the coalition demanded more information from pharmaceutical companies.
“This is a bipartisan effort to address I think some of these questions that many people have as to how this epidemic started,” Donovan said.
This isn’t the first time states have taken legal action against companies accused of profting from addictive products, Donovan said, citing litigation against Big Tobacco in the 1990s.
Some states have already started bringing litigation. Last week, the Washington Attorney General’s Office filed a suit against Purdue, the manufacturer of OxyContin.
