APA Calls for Opioid Settlements to Fund Workforce Training, Treatment

Some funds from the class action suits filed against opioid manufacturers should be used to expand the number of health professionals who are trained to treat patients with substance use disorders (SUDs), disseminate evidence-based treatments, and enforce parity laws, according to APA and six other mental health and addiction specialty groups.

APA and its partners made their request in a letter to the attorneys representing the classes of patients represented in lawsuits filed against pharmaceutical companies for the manufacture and promotion of opioids that resulted in widespread addiction and overdose. The letter was also copied to Judge Dan Aaron Polster of the Northern District of Ohio, who is presiding over the class action suits.

The letter was accompanied by a 29-page white paper outlining the scope of the opioid epidemic and an analysis of what is necessary to meet the demand for treatment.

“While opioid addiction is complex, it is treatable and preventable,” APA CEO and Medical Director Saul Levin, M.D., M.P.A., and leaders of the other groups wrote, “but not with current limitations on the workforce trained in the treatment of substance use disorders, limited access to quality care, and discriminatory insurance coverage for mental health and substance use disorders. Should there be a settlement of the legal cases, we respectfully request that funds be used to expand the workforce qualified to prevent and treat substance use and mental health disorders; disseminate trainings and education regarding evidence-based treatments to increase adoption of clinical best practices; and enforce mental health and addiction parity and consumer protection statutes in states.”

Also signing the letter were Kevin A. Sevarino, M.D., Ph.D., president of the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry; Gabrielle A. Carlson, M.D., president of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry; Martha J. Wunsch, M.D., president of the American College of Academic Addiction Medicine; Paul Earley, M.D., president of the American Society of Addiction Medicine; Paula J. Lum, M.D., M.P.H., president of the Association for Multidisciplinary Education and Research in Substance Use and Addiction; and Kathleen T. Brady, M.D., Ph.D., president of the International Society of Addiction Medicine.

In addition to boosting the workforce and disseminating best practices, the 29-page white paper emphasized the need for more rigorous enforcement of parity laws. “State insurance commissions and attorneys general have significant workloads of which parity and consumer health fraud are but a small part. These agencies need additional resources to aggressively and proactively ensure compliance with existing federal and state laws in order to guarantee that discrimination against those with mental health and SUDs and misrepresentations about insurance coverage do not preclude access to evidence-based care.”

The paper concluded: “There is no silver bullet that will cure those with addiction and co-occurring mental illness or that will cure or prevent another crisis. However, the funding generated from this litigation could be used to make substantial progress toward controlling the OUD epidemic and ensuring that it or similar substance use consequences do not recur in the future. … What the litigants can do immediately is use some of the funds that will come out of this litigation to ensure that there is an adequately trained health care professional workforce to continue the research into prevention and treatment of addiction, to treat patients using clinical best practices, and to guarantee that persons with addiction and/or mental illness have access to nondiscriminatory health insurance to afford their treatment.” ■