Marin Agencies Receive Grants To Assist With Opioid Crisis

MARIN COUNTY, CA – The Center at Sierra Health Foundation has awarded more than $16.4 million to 120 organizations throughout California, including thousands of dollars to Marin County organizations.

The funds will go through the Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) Access Points Project to ensure that the delivery of MAT facilitates positive treatment outcomes, safe management of care transitions and long-term recovery for people with opioid and other substance use disorders.

Four organizations in Marin were given nearly $500,000 through the MAT Access Points Project:

• The county's Department of Health and Human Services' Behavioral Health and Recovery Services Division received $184,000 for program development and to help fund a recovery coach position to facilitate care coordination between acute care mental health locations.
• Marin General Hospital received $100,000 to help fund educational efforts and support addiction program development.
• Marin Treatment Center received $100,000 to assist justice-involved individuals with opioid use disorder and expand treatment options for individuals with Medicare.
• Center Point, Inc. received $100,000 to expand access to MAT through their programming by engaging additional medical providers.

The MAT Access Points Project is funded through the Department of Health Care Services California MAT Expansion Project and administered by The Center at Sierra Health Foundation.

In related news, the county's Department of Health and Human Services has received a similar $135,000 MAT expansion grant to increase the availability of medications for addiction treatment in criminal justice settings. That grant facilitated the collaboration of custody health, adult drug court, Marin County public health and behavioral health, Marin City Health and Wellness, and Bay Area Community Resources.

The Department of Health and Human Services, the RxSafe Marin coalition, and various local stakeholders such as the Spahr Center and the Marin County Jail have received additional grants to reduce opioid abuse in recent years. The grants have led to the distribution of hundreds of narcan opioid overdose reversal kits through community trainings, local treatment providers, libraries, police, and directly to jail inmates.

"All these grants fit into our larger goal of addressing the opioid epidemic locally through collective efforts that expand access to treatment, especially MAT," said Dr. Jeff DeVido of the Department of Health and Human Services. "Expanding access to treatment is one of our priority goals of HHS and RxSafe Marin, our local opioid coalition."

DeVido said other goals include decreasing opioid supply through education about safe prescribing and good medication stewardship as well as expanding safe disposal options and decreasing the risk of overdose through expansion of the availability of narcan.

More than 2,000 people die from opioid-related deaths in California each year. Marin has averaged 215 drug-overdose fatalities over the past seven years, many opioid-related, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.