Senate GOP Opioid Funding is Just 'Like Spitting in the Ocean'

Senate Republicans are supposedly proposing a number of changes to their mean and heartless Trumpcare bill prior to the July 4th recess, including at least $45 billion for opioid addiction treatment.  Funding for opioids sounds great right?  Yeah, not so much in this case.

The fact is: modest funding simply cannot make up for throwing 15 million Americans off of Medicaid, as CBO says the Senate bill does.  An estimated 2.8 million people with substance use disorders, including those with an opioid disorder, could lose some or all of their coverage if the ACA's Medicaid expansion is rapidly phased out, as it is in Trumpcare.

There is a big difference between giving states a lump sum of money versus providing people with insurance coverage, which allows them to seek care when they need it – including care for mental illness and physical health problems that often accompany battling opioid addiction.

Replacing the health coverage that people struggling with opioid addiction have now with state grants would fall far short of getting hundreds of thousands of people struggling with opioid addiction the care that they need.

This rumored funding is nothing more than a drop in the bucket for what's needed to actually combat the opioid crisis.

"It doesn't cover nearly what the needs are from these populations." – Harvard Medical School Professor Richard Frank

"That's like spitting in the ocean." – Ohio Governor John Kasich

"A siloed small amount of money." – Senator Maggie Hassan

In reality, Trumpcare worsens the opioid crisis in two major ways:

• By cutting Medicaid by hundreds of billions of dollars:

• Under Trumpcare, by slashing Medicaid, 1.3 million people with serious mental disorders and 2.8 million people with substance use disorders – including people fighting opioid addiction– would no longer have access to the health care they need.

• By gutting the essential health benefits:

• Under Trumpcare, which allows states to waive essential health benefits, those with insurance could be denied the critical benefits they need – including substance use treatment services, mental health services, and prescription drug coverage.  This means that even those who don't lose their Medicaid coverage could lose access to the treatment they need.

Republicans should not be able to get away with their cynical attack on our country's most vulnerable.  Whatever window dressing Senate Republicans try to put on Trumpcare over the coming days, nothing will change the cold heart at the center of the GOP's plan for seniors and working people across America.