Opioid Use Disorder

The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York cleared the way for a controversial bankruptcy deal that grants immunity from opioid lawsuits to members of the Sackler family.

If Vermont wants to reduce last year's record 237 overdose deaths, the health commissioner says, the state needs to find ways to connect people using opioids with treatment options. Many of the people who died had no connection to treatment.

All told, drugmakers and distributors will pay over $50 billion to communities harmed by opioids. An investigation finds that only a dozen states are letting the public see how they use the money.

The cash represents an unprecedented opportunity to derail the opioid epidemic. But with countless groups advocating for a share of the pie, the impact could depend heavily on geography and politics.

After years of litigation and investigation against opioid manufacturers, money is coming in. Vermont is slated to receive more than $100 million the cases that have been settled so far, according to the attorney general’s office. That number will go up, because Vermont is slated to receive funds from recent national settlements with four drug makers that combined, total more than $8.5 billion.

The lawsuit accused them of causing a health crisis by distributing 81 million pills over eight years in one West Virginia county ravaged by opioid addiction.

The law enforcement effort comes as opioid overdose rates are again spiking in New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont.

A record number of Vermonters — 215 — died of opioid overdoses last year. One of those Vermonters was Matthew Hayes, a 22-year-old from Waterbury.

The state of Vermont reached a grim milestone this month when the Health Department reported that 210 Vermonters died from opioid overdoses in 2021. It is the highest number of fatal opioid overdoses the state has ever recorded.

Vermont could receive millions of dollars under a national settlement reached Thursday with Oxycontin manufacturer Purdue Pharma and its owners, the Sackler family. The deal still needs to be approved by a federal judge.