Trumpcare Would Worsen Opioid Crisis in DuPage County: Senator Durbin

WHEATON, IL — DuPage County’s opioid epidemic would blow up if Trumpcare and the AHCA are approved, Senator Dick Durbin warned during a meeting at Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital. He says the plan would limit access to treatment facilities, which could lead to an increase in overdose deaths. Last year, 78 people were killed by opioid overdoses in DuPage County, which was a more than 50% increase from 2015, according to a press release on the senator’s official website.

Trump proposes a budget cut that would gouge funding to the Centers of Disease Control and Substance Abuse by $130 million. The cuts would also affect the Mental Health Services Administration. Both of these could be harsh blows to people in substance abuse treatment, as mental health issues are often at the root of substance misuse.

Durbin slammed the AHCA as “irresponsible and dangerous. The AHCA would give insurers the go-ahead to deny coverage of substance abuse treatment, Durbin’s statement said. If the bill —which was recently passed in the House and still has to go to the Senate— is approved, it could impact residents with work-based insurance. The bill also aims to “slash Medicaid funding by $40 million,” according to the statement.

Opioid deaths are on the rise in DuPage County with fentanyl and the designer drug acrylfentanyl, which is sold online, adding to the rapid increase. Countless substance users use Medicaid for affordable access to drug treatment, but that access will be on thin ice if the AHCA is approved.

Durbin attacked Trump’s budget plan and the AHCA, saying, “In the midst of the most devastating drug abuse epidemic in our history, the Republican health care bill passed in the House could cut off access to addiction treatment – even for those who get insurance through their employer – and throw millions of Americans off their health insurance.”

He added, “I will fight to protect the gains we have made under the ACA, and continue to support our most vulnerable populations and the providers that serve them.”

>>Image credit: By Viktorija Rozman (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons