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Earlier this month, Sens. Shelley Capito, R-W.Va., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., announced more than $6.6 million in U.S. Department of Health and Human Services funding for overdose prevention efforts in West Virginia. Specifically, the money will go to the Violence and Injury Prevention Program: Overdose Data to Action through the state Department of Health and Human Resources.
Data collection from the program is meant to better prevent and respond to overdose deaths. That is a good thing, of course. The more we know, the better we can save lives. But prevention should involve a broad set of strategies. Substance abuse and overdoses are a symptom of a much larger problem. Those who are generationally poor, undereducated, isolated and/or suffering from mental health woes -- and who are living in a culture that tends to devalue learning, mental healthcare and moving away from "tradition," no matter how damaging "tradition" has been to their families -- have had little reason to hope lately. A pandemic did not help matters.
"The opioid epidemic continues to have devastating impacts on our state, our communities, and our families. Recent data from the CDC shows that overdose deaths skyrocketed 49% in West Virginia last year as a result of the pandemic. Those numbers are incredibly stark, and reemphasize the importance of ensuring that states have the necessary resources to end the addiction crisis in our communities," Capito said.
Will those resources be used to tackle the real problem, or just the symptom?
"The CDC's Overdose Data to Action program helps integrate the information we receive into tangible, on-the-ground prevention strategies and solutions," Capito said. "No two communities are the same, and our approaches to end this crisis should resemble that. I'm confident that this funding and this program can have a meaningful impact across West Virginia in our continued battle against substance use."
If at least some of the strategies do not involve facing reality -- an effort to boost the economy and shift the culture that created this monster in the first place -- all the data in the world will not stop what is happening in the Mountain State.