(1/16) 🧵 on the understanding the opioid settlement landscape & how #HarmReduction orgs can access desperately needed funding.
The opioid settlement process is a big ole mess, but the Coalition for Syringe Access & @AIDS_United created a slide deck to try & clear things up.
(2/16) To be clear, this is a very incomplete overview of the opioid settlement landscape.
This is just the preface of a book that we as a community still need to write & there is so much that I need to learn about the opioid settlement infrastructure.
(3/16) Y'all know the backstory:
Pharma did some shady 💩 around opioid marketing & distribution that supercharged the opioid epidemic. State, local & tribal governments sued, & now Pharma is on the hook for billions of dollars.
(4/16) I know Purdue pharma gets a lot of the press around the Rx opioid epidemic (and deservedly so), but there were a whooooole lot of bad actors & they're all paying to varying degrees.
(5/16) Think of state opioid settlement plans as movie adaptations of books.
Some states are going to be true to the original text.
Some states will actually improve upon the original.
And some will completely butcher it.
(6/16) The global opioid settlement is not perfect, but it is a hell of a lot better than what we've had similar settlements in the past.
This is not the Big Tobacco settlement. 70% of this money must go towards future efforts to end the opioid epidemic & serve PWUD.
(7/16) Look at all of these gorgeous things that the opioid settlement money can theoretically be used for:
Naloxone! MAT! Syringes for SSPs! Recovery services! Maternal care!
It's a beautiful thing to see.
(8/16) Unfortunately, there's a whole lot of badness & wasted spending that can come from this as well.
Police WILL get a lot of this money.
Abstinence-only prevention campaigns will get some too.
Absent our voices in the conversation, the same old programs will get funded.
(9/16) In the Global Settlement, a 70-15-15 split was proposed between a newly created opioid abatement accounts, direct funding to states, & direct funding to states.
But, this allocation breakdown is only as useful as a state's plans for the funding.
(10/16) Using the earlier movie adaptation analogy, California's settlement plan is No Country for Old Men: faithful to the original & amazing.
North Carolina's could wind up being Lord of The Rings, taking a good thing & making it even better depending on how the money is used.
(11/16) I'm pretty sure my analogy is running on fumes right now, but you can look at Missouri's opioid settlement distribution as Twilight & Louisiana's as 50 Shades of Gray.
Bad adaptation of a bad book vs. bad adaptation of bad fanfic vanilla erotica of a bad book.
(12/16) Where you live determines how you need to go about seeking opioid settlement money.
Some states & localities will make it easy for the best programs to get money...some will make it very hard.
(13/16) Opioidsettlementracker.com is going to be your opioid settlement funding bible. Bookmark it. Know it. Love it.
Much of the documentation you need to get an understanding of your state's settlement plans can be found on this site.
(14/16) If there are open grant portals in your state or locality, you're going to have to do work to find them.
Harm Reduction advocates across the country are working on collecting this information, but it doesn't exist yet.
(15/16) If your state has an active opioid settlement board, do your research on it.
If there's any way to influence the the activity of those boards, either from inside or the outside.
(16/16) If this all seems like too much, don't worry. That's because it is.
Making sure opioid settlement money actually benefits people who use opioids shouldn't be this hard.
If you have any questions, please reach out to me in the comments or message me.
Folks, feel free to share this resource @MyHarmReduction @stephenHRNRP @Kassandra_Fred @clairezagorski @el_sabawi @nabarund @LeoBeletsky @RS_McNeil @vinayrkrishnan @Filtermag_org @jillmarette99 @traceyh415
I also have it in power point form.
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