Seward County groups assisting those who are addicted to or impacted by other people’s addiction to opioids may soon have a local grant source for their programs.
The Seward County Board of Commissioners on Aug. 27 adopted the national opioid settlement’s grant criteria and application process and Commissioner Raegan Hain said the application will likely be posted on the county’s website in September to award some or all of the approximately $15,000 the county has now received.
Additional funds are anticipated
Seward County commissioners earlier this year opted to leave the state’s grant pool and receive its own share of the national opioid settlements. These include settlement payments from companies related to the pharmaceutical or its sale, including Janssen, Cardinal, McKesson, AmerisourceBergen, Teva, Allergan, CVS, Walgreens, Walmart and Kroger Co.
The county had previously participated in the state pool, but would have had to submit grant applications with the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services or Region V to obtain local funding.
“We felt that it was best if we returned the funds available to Seward County,” Hain said.
She wants to see people who are having issues with opioid addiction getting access to services they need in Seward County.
Local programs would still be eligible to apply for funding from the state’s settlement pool for programs.
Hain will coordinate the county grants program and said in an interview a few days after the meeting that the scope of projects that can be funded is very specific.
Programs must do one or more of these things:
• Treat opioid use disorder
• Support people in treatment and recovery
• Help connect people to the help they need
• Address needs of people involved in the criminal justice system
• Address needs of pregnant or parenting women and their families, including babies with neonatal abstinence syndrome
• Prevent over-prescribing and ensure appropriate prescribing and dispensing of opioids
• Prevent misuse of opioids
• Prevent overdose deaths and other harms
• Aid first responders
• Aid leadership, planning and coordination
• Provide training
• Advance research
Each applicant will be asked to justify their proposal and how it aligns with the need in Seward County. The document adopted by the county includes 11 pages of eligible program examples.
The Four Corners Health Department that serves Seward, Polk, York and Butler counties provides information about opioids on its website as well as offering training programs for people related to opioid addiction and its impacts.
Opioids are often prescribed when people are dealing with acute pain, including after surgeries, the website said. The drugs interact with receptors in the brain to dull the perception of pain and can boost feelings of pleasure.
An overdose occurs when there is more drug in the person’s system than the body can cope with.
The abuse of prescribed opioids and the use of illegally marketed opioids, including synthetic versions like fentanyl, create problems related to both addiction and overdose.
While the national rate of overdose deaths rose 31% from 2019 to 2020, Nebraska’s overdose deaths rose 55% to 214 in that time. Nationally, 92,000 deaths were attributed to drug overdose in 2020, according to Four Corner’s posted information.
Nearly 85% of overdose deaths involved illicitly manufactured fentanyl, cocaine, heroin or methamphetamine either individually or in some combination.
Laura McDougall, Four Corners Health Department director, said opioids and other drugs cause a myriad of health dangers and other issues.
“We are not immune from the problems of overdose or opioids,” she said of the four-county area.
It can be difficult to compare health data county by county in rural areas due to privacy concerns because of the small population, she said. But they are aware that there are a couple of age ranges, including older adults age 55 to 64, in which opioid issues are seen in the region.
One of the areas Four Corners staff works on is training teachers, first responders and other groups how to respond if someone may have overdosed.
Four Corners advises people to call 911 as soon as they think someone is overdosing and stay with them until emergency responders arrive. Signs include being unresponsive to voice or touch, having a slow heartbeat or low blood pressure, the pupils of the eyes being small like pinpoints, slow or irregular breathing, or blue lips, skin or fingernails.
Nebraska’s Good Samaritan Law, limits civil liability for people who help others in emergencies like overdose, accidents or other emergency situations.
The Four Corners Health Department information can be found at: https://fourcorners.ne.gov/drug-and-alcohol-overdose-prevention-resources.
