Ohio's Opioid Technology Challenge To Be Run By NineSigma

BEACHWOOD, OH — NineSigma, a Beachwood-based tech consultancy, has been selected to manage the Ohio Opioid Technology Challenge. The contest will see $7 million in grants awarded to companies and entrepreneurs for technology that may help prevent prescription overdoses or aid in treatment and response.

The Ohio Third Frontier Commission announced Tuesday that it had selected NineSigma to oversee the competition. NineSigma will receive $8 million to manage the challenge. Most of that $8 million will be used to give out monetary prizes in the challenge.

Ohio has been called the "face" of the nation's opioid epidemic. In one particularly gruesome stretch in the two weeks leading up to and including Memorial Day weekend 2017, at least 43 people died from fatal opioid overdoses. Ohio women are spending more time as inpatients being treated for opioid addiction than women in almost any other state, according to a recent report from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project and Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

The director of the Ohio Development Services Agency, and chair of the Third Frontier Commission, David Goodman, said in a statement to Crain's Cleveland that Ohio's opioid crisis is "touching everyone, and we all need to be part of the solution. Taking ideas and advancing technology is one more way to ensure we leave no stone unturned in the fight against addiction."

Several Northeast Ohio communities have debated classifying the battle with opioids as a public health crisis. Lakewood did declare a public health crisis earlier in 2017, with the hopes of qualifying for additional state and federal funding for prevention and treatment programs.

Read More On Ohio's Opioid Crisis

• Deadly Overdose Spike Since Memorial Day In Northeast Ohio
• Ohio Sues 5 Opioid Drug Producers
• Recovering Addict Reforms Police Approach To Opiates
• Curbing Opiates: Doctors Addicted To Overprescribing

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