Opioid treatment industry expands as stigma decreases and more states cover treatment under Medicaid - Entrepreneur Generations

Methadone clinics in the U.S. (Stateline map; click here for the interactive version)

The opioid epidemic has been spreading throughout the U.S. for years, but the number of addiction treatment clinics has not risen along with it until fairly recently. Part of that is because methadone, and the clinics that dispense it, have been stigmatized and met with skepticism from both politicians and the general public. But that's starting to change: "The methadone treatment industry, which began in the late 1960s, grew more in the past four years than it has in the past two decades," Christine Vestal reports for Stateline. "Between 2014 and 2018, the methadone industry added 254 new clinics."

Stigma has been a powerful damper, though. Some people living near methadone clinics worry that drug-treatment centers attract crime, and dislike seeing a crowded parking lot of opioid addicts every day waiting in line for their dose. Unlike the other two medications approved to treat opioid addiction, methadone must be administered daily by a specially licensed doctor at a highly regulated clinic, Vestal reports. The regulatory hoops can discourage clinics from opening too.

But as the opioid epidemic continues to hurt Americans, many states are opening dozens of new facilities in rural and suburban areas, including Indiana, Maryland, New York, Ohio and Florida. "At the same time, laws and regulations in at least six other states — Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, West Virginia and Wyoming — still curtail licensing of new methadone clinics, even though people with opioid addictions in large swaths of those states live too far from the nearest methadone clinic to commute," Vestal reports.

More opioid users can now access treatment too, since many states that expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care and Patient Protection Act began offering reimbursement for methadone treatment in the past four years. That's given the treatment industry the financial incentive to expand.

"Remaining states that do not allow Medicaid reimbursement for methadone treatment are Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wyoming, several of which have among the nation’s highest rates of opioid addiction and overdose deaths," Vestal reports. In January 2020, Medicare will begin covering methadone treatment for seniors.

from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/2AH98mK Opioid treatment industry expands as stigma decreases and more states cover treatment under Medicaid - Entrepreneur Generations

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