BURLINGTON – Democratic gubernatorial candidate Brenda Siegel launched a comprehensive plan to fight opioid addiction on Thursday, joined by Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George, who backed the plan.
The four-part strategy focuses on harm reduction, treatment on demand, recovery and prevention, dual diagnosis support and criminal justice reform.
“It is time to be bold,” Siegel said at a news conference outside Burlington’s Edward J. Costello Courthouse. “It is time to lead with love and compassion, not stigma and shame. It is time to use practices we know work to stop death and reduce the collateral damage associated with this disease.”
George said Siegel reached out to her last week to discuss the plan.
“Not only do I think that her plan is bold — and courageous and brave — but more importantly it’s clearly derived from evidence-based research, data, real-life experience and moral integrity,” George said.
George said she feels fortunate to be doing her work in Chittenden County, a region that is open to change and home to a treatment court for dealing with addicts who run afoul with the law.
For Siegel, a Newfane resident, opioid addiction is an issue that has hit close to home.
The day Siegel announced her candidacy for governor in March, she said she received a call that her nephew had died of a heroin overdose in the bathroom at his job. His father, Siegel’s brother, died 20 years earlier of an overdose.
Siegel said she watched the support system repeatedly fail her nephew. He sought treatment at Maple Leaf Treatment Center, only to see the facility close unannounced.
“There is a lack of harm reduction and adequate treatment throughout the state, and finally within the criminal justice system,” Siegel said.
Vermont’s “hub and spoke” system is at the center of state efforts to address the opioid epidemic, and was held up by Gov. Phil Scott as a national model during a trip to Washington, D.C., earlier this year.
A law passed by the Legislature this session expanded medication-assisted addiction treatment for prisoners, while another law that failed to make it to the governor would have taxed opioid producers to help fund prevention and treatment efforts.
Vermont also distributes thousands of free doses of the overdose drug naloxone every year. And officials have imposed new limits on painkiller prescriptions.
But the data is still going in the wrong direction.
Although heroin death dropped slightly last year, there was an increase in deaths from the prescription drug fentanyl. The number of deaths involving heroin declined from 51 in 2016 to 41 in 2017. But fatal overdoses involving fentanyl increased from 51 to 68.
Siegel said Thursday that Vermont needed to look outside its borders, and to best practices in its biggest city, for model policies that can be applied across the state.
In other countries that have adopted strong harm reduction and decriminalization practices, deaths have slowed or stopped, Siegel said. Burlington has adopted changes including unlimited use of Narcan, an overdose response drug, and clean needle exchanges, but those measures have not been rolled out across the state.
Siegel said she wants to establish harm reduction centers, often referred to as safe injection sites, in all of Vermont’s counties. These facilities would provide services including fentanyl testing and clean needles.
In rural areas, Siegel said there is a need for mobile harm reduction units.
“This epidemic is affecting every inch of our state, whether you know it or not,” Siegel said.
Siegel’s main competitors for the Democratic nomination, Christine Hallquist and James Ehlers, both include the opioid epidemic in their priority issues.
Ehlers says he supports safe injection sites and increased investment in prevention and recovery programs. Hallquist says that preventive and proactive treatment is a “moral imperative,” but wants to investigate whether safe injection sites should be set up across the state.
Siegel said her plan includes treatment and medically assisted treatment on demand, expanding Medicaid to cover long-term treatment and improve access to health care.
The last step of Siegel’s plan is criminal justice reform, focused on expanding “compassionate” treatment courts in every county, as well as required opioid training for every prosecutor, judge and law enforcement officer in Vermont.
She is also calling for statewide decriminalization of suboxone-buprenorphine, a drug used to treat opioid addiction, and wants recognition that cannabis is a safe alternative to opiods.
Siegel would like to see automatic expungement for any crimes that are currently eligible, and anything legalized by the Legislature.
“It is time that we treat this disease like a disease not a crime,” Siegel said.
She said her proposal would be paid for over time, with a tax and regulate system for cannabis, and cost savings from a reduction in emergency room visits and other medical care.
“Our best chance at safe communities, and raising children who don’t experience the death of their friends with great frequency, is to follow best practices that lead to people having the tools to get help to reduce the harm of their use,” Siegel said.
George, the state’s attorney, said that most discussions around ending the opioid epidemic go little beyond the fact that the issue needs to be addressed.
“I think that it is great that [Siegel] is not only talking about it,” George said, “but she is willing to tell everybody exactly what she plans on doing, and how she plans on doing it.”
