6 Months Since Trump Declared an Opioid Emergency, What's Changed? (Governing)
Wednesday Apr 25th, 2018
On Oct. 26 last year, President Donald Trump declared the opioid epidemic -- which took more than 64,000 lives in 2016 -- a national emergency.
'“We’ve seen no effect here in Baltimore from the emergency [declaration]," says Leana Wen, the city's health commissioner. "We could save so many more lives if we had more resources. We don’t need any more rhetoric."
Wen worked with members of Congress to take matters of money into their own hands.
Last week, U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings and U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren introduced the Comprehensive Addiction Resources Emergency (CARE) Act. It would require the federal government to spend $10 billion a year for 10 years on the opioid crisis. A sizable portion of that would go directly to state and local governments: $4 billion a year to states and $2.7 billion to cities and counties. The money would not be dependent on Congressional approval every year.