"This has to be a bigger topic": Minnesota lawmakers determined to curb opioid deaths
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Minnesota lawmakers say in order to tackle the opioid epidemic, it needs to be treated as a public health crisis.
"It's a tough subject and one that we need to tackle," Gov. Tim Walz said.
Monday morning, Walz and Rep. Angie Craig hosted a roundtable discussion to talk about solutions and challenges to the issue.
"This is a public safety issue in our nation and our state," Craig said.
Stakeholders in the opioid crisis — from those fighting to prevent deaths on the ground to families impacted — gathered to share their stories.
"This has to be a bigger topic of conversation," Shakopee Police Chief Jeff Tate said. "It is the number one killer of adults 18 to 45 in this country. We're losing 100,000 people a year."
Bridgette Norring is a Hastings mother who lost her 19-year-old son to fentanyl poisoning nearly four years ago. She shared her efforts on educating her community to the dangers.
"Everything we learned about this crisis, we learned about after it was too late," she said. "We didn't know anything about fentanyl or naloxone, where to get it, how to access it. So, now we know that and we put that into our community."
Last year, lawmakers allocated more than $200 million to address substance abuse and the opioid crisis, aimed towards prevention, hard reduction, treatment and recovery. This year, the Minnesota Department of Health will give several million dollars in grants for opioid overdose prevention.
"Moving this money as quickly as possible from state government to local government and nonprofits and agencies is the right way to do it," Walz said.
It includes "culturally-specific" overdose prevention programs that will help struggling communities overcome language and education barriers.
"Most of our members are from that neighborhood, not someone from the outside telling them, 'hey, this is what we need to do,' but community members that support themselves," Metro Youth Diversion Center Executive Director Rashad Ahmed said.
MDH will close the grant application on March 15.
