Editorial: With criminal crackdown, funding community treatment for addiction impacts even more crucial

CBC Editorial: Wednesday, March 22, 2023; editorial #8834

The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company

The numbers alone speak loudly the tragedy facing not just the victims of the opioid crisis in North Carolina but of the anguish of family, friends and communities.

• In the first two months of 2018, there were 1,945 overdose related visits to North Carolina emergency rooms. The first two months of this year a 47% increase to 2,836. On a yearly basis, comparing 2018 to 2022, the increase has been 39% to 16,921 visits.
• February a year ago, there were 315 opioid overdose deaths in the state. This February 320 deaths. In 2018 there were 2,552 opioid deaths statewide. That increased 64% to 4,242 in 2022.
• In the first 11 months of 2018 there were 1,140 fentanyl-related deaths in the state. Over the same period last year it increased 169% to 3,062.
• More than twice the number of people are dying of drug overdoses in the state than are being killed in motor vehicle accidents.

So, it comes as little surprise that North Carolina legislators are looking to address the matter to demonstrate their concerns. Senate Bill 189, which would create new criminal offenses – and serious punishments -- for drug dealers who sell drugs that cause the death of someone – and particularly those dealers who know the lethal potential of drugs they deal.

Increasing penalties and punishments give new and helpful tools to law enforcement but don’t really address the reason these criminals take the risk – the huge demand for the deadly drugs they peddle.

“We can’t arrest our way out of this problem,” said Louise Vincent, current director of the North Carolina Survivors Union that seeks to promote effort to reduce drug use and dependency, in a recent interview. She lost a daughter to a drug overdose.

"Someone might think after my experiences I would say yes something like this,” she said in reaction to House Bill 189. “It’s so much easier to be angry and punish than it is to be resourceful and work hard to develop something new that actually works.”

That is why North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein’s leadership has been critical in addressing the broad scope of the opioid crisis. He’s been in the forefront of legislation to toughen penalties and is seeking funding for a Fentanyl Control Unit within the state Department of Justice’s Special Prosecutions and Law Enforcement Section.

But even more significantly he has been a national leader in going after those who are most culpable in this epidemic – the drug manufacturers and sales agencies that are the root. In disregard for the dangers, these sectors of the pharmaceutical industry pushed sales and use without adequate warnings or supervision of sales or the patients who eventually became hooked.

His efforts have help win more than $47.5 billion nationally in settlements. The money from the manufacturers and distributors mostly is going directly to community-based efforts to treat and fight addiction and related issues.

To the degree that there is any significant money available in North Carolina communities for programs to treat those suffering from opioid dependency, provide training to those seeking to educate and assist those confronting the epidemic as well as resources for greater intervention and law enforcement – it has been through Stein’s efforts.

Through settlements, North Carolina is in line to receive at least $1.4 billion to confront the crisis. North Carolina has started to receive about $750 million that is going directly to local community-based efforts while about 15% is distributed by state agencies. Given the scope of the problem, even $1.4 billion is a token of what is needed to effectively address the addiction scourge.

Getting tough criminal laws grabs get-tough headlines and photo opportunities with uniformed law enforcement leaders. But legislators must not neglect the larger part of the problem – cutting the demand and getting those who are hooked the opportunity for treatment and recovery.

Legislators need to demonstrate the same enthusiasm to fund recovery and rehabilitation efforts that will do just as much, if not more, to make our communities safer and healthier.

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