Jan 8, 2019 3 min read

Before the administration of Gov. Tom Wolf established 45 Centers of Excellence across the commonwealth in 2017, only about 48 percent of Pennsylvanians on Medicaid who were struggling with opioid addiction were receiving treatment, and only about one-third of that number were still receiving treatment after 30 days.

Since the Centers of Excellence started helping those individuals, 70 percent are receiving treatment, and 60 percent are still in treatment after 30 days.

That was one of the facts that emerged during a midday press conference in Harrisburg Monday, where officials from the Wolf administration outlined what they characterized as progress in combating the widespread opioid epidemic across Pennsylvania. They also said these efforts would continue in Wolf’s second term, which will get under way a week from today.

“It can be very daunting for a family or someone willing to seek treatment to find treatment,” said Lynn Kovich, Pennsylvania’s deputy secretary for mental health and substance abuse services. “We’re happy this is a first step in someone’s recovery.”

Though Wolf was not at the press conference, he said in a statement, “My administration has worked to assist those people who are struggling with opioid use disorder by increasing access to Medicaid, offering a free hotline for people to get help and providing naloxone to first responders and the public. We are hopeful the number of opioid deaths is decreasing, and we pledge to continue our efforts to assist people affected by this epidemic.”

Along with offering a summation of what the Wolf administration has done over the last four years, the press conference also marked the first anniversary of Wolf declaring the opioid epidemic a disaster across Pennsylvania, which allowed the governor to pull together state agencies and bypass legal and regulatory mechanisms to more directly confront it. Initially put in place for 90 days, it has been renewed four times, with the most recent reactivation happening in December. Among other things, the disaster declaration allows individuals seeking treatment to waive birth certificate fees, allows for the use of Medicaid funding in treatment facilities, and helps recovering addicts receive assistance in getting jobs.

Officials also said the state’s Prescription Drug Monitoring Program has just about eliminated doctor shopping in the state, and has reduced the prescription of opioids by more than 20 percent. More than 20,000 Pennsylvania physicians have also been trained to prescribe opioids with greater caution, and a little more than 800 drug take-back boxes have allowed close to 500,000 pounds of unwanted drugs to be disposed of properly.

The headway that has been made in Pennsylvania corresponds with progress that has been made nationally. A report released last May by the American Medical Association found that the number opioid prescriptions has been persistently declining, health care professionals have been using state databases and access to overdose-reversing naloxone has been increasing.