PA Opioid Disaster Declaration Expiring Despite Overdose Surge

HARRISBURG, PA — Gov. Tom Wolf vowed that his administration will remain focused on combating the opioid epidemic in the state, despite the fact that his opioid disaster declaration expires Wednesday.

The General Assembly declined Wolf's request to maintain the disaster order, which he first declared in 2018 and unilaterally extended 15 times. Wolf is unable to do so again because voters in May approved a referendum limiting a governor's emergency powers.

Emergency declarations now end after 21 days and lawmakers now have the authority to extend or end them via a majority vote.

Wolf said earlier this month programs designed to curb opioid addiction would be impacted by an
expiration of the declaration, in particular information shared with other state agencies through the administration’s prescription drug monitoring program.

Although Wolf was rebuffed in his effort to keep the declaration in place, the governor said the state's fight against opioid addiction is far from over.

"We have an obligation to support individuals desperately in need of substance use disorder services and supports," he said "With or without a disaster declaration, this will remain a top priority of my administration.”

The declaration is ending despite a sharp spike in overdose deaths in Pennsylvania last year.According to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, preliminary statistics indicate fatal overdoses increased from 4,505 to 5,278 - a 16.4 percent increase.

Wolf attributed the jump to the coronavirus outbreak.

“We made a lot of progress before the COVID-19 pandemic struck, both in putting improved systems in place to help Pennsylvanians and in reducing overdose deaths in the commonwealth by nearly twenty percent from 2017 to 2020," he noted.

“Unfortunately, the isolation and disruption caused by the pandemic over the past year and half has also caused a heartbreaking increase in substance use disorder and overdose deaths."

According to the state's Opioid Data Dashboard, from January 2018 through Aug. 7 2o21, EMS personnel across the state administered 36,121 doses of Naloxone, a medicine that rapidly reverses opioid overdoses. There were 57,518 calls to the state's narcotics-focused Get Help Now Hotline.

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