Pennsylvania Auditor General's Report Takes Aim at Fentanyl Crisis

By DAVE FIDLIN

The Center Square

When it comes to the war against opioid addiction, one specific drug – fentanyl – needs to be targeted with new legislation and other efforts, a Pennsylvania official said at a recent news conference.

Auditor General Eugene DePasquale unveiled a new report, “A Deadly Dose: Fentanyl’s Impact on Pennsylvania.” The 17-page document includes 10 recommendations as efforts to curtail opioid-related overdoses and deaths continue.

At the news conference, DePasquale highlighted one of the recommendations, which is aimed at state lawmakers.

Fentanyl test strips are considered illegal across Pennsylvania because they are classified as drug paraphernalia.

“That needs to change, and the General Assembly has the power to make that happen,” DePasquale said.

In the report, DePasquale said fentanyl test strips have specifically been singled out as effective devices because they allow users to determine if fentanyl is present in a person’s system. He deemed it “one of the best overdose-prevention measures developed so far.”

“A Deadly Dose” also sheds light on numerous statistical pieces of data from 2017, which is the most recent year with comprehensive statistical information available.

Pennsylvania taxpayers paid at least $178 million for opioid-related hospital stays in 2017, according to DePasquale’s report.

The document also asserts fentanyl contributed to a 65-percent increase in overdose deaths between 2015 and 2017, when the opioid-related deaths were at their height.

The challenge with fentanyl, DePasquale said, is the synthetic drug can be up to 50 times more powerful than heroin. Because of its highly addictive properties and the ability to manufacture it cheaply, DePasquale said it remains a challenge.

“A person can die from fentanyl without even knowing they took it,” said DePasquale, who pointed out he lost a family member – a cousin – to an opioid-related overdose.

There is evidence to suggest the state is making strides in stemming the tide of opioid overdoses and deaths, which spiked in 2017. But throughout the news conference, DePasquale called on lawmakers to double down on their efforts.

“While Pennsylvania was able to achieve an 18-percent drop in overdose deaths from 2017 to 2018, mainly due to the increased access to overdose reversal medications like naloxone, the state still saw more than 4,000 overdose deaths last year,” he said in a news release issued immediately after the news conference.

Beyond the call to legalize fentanyl test strips, DePasquale’s report includes a number of other recommendations for state and federal lawmakers, some less concrete than others.

One of the recommendations, for instance, states, “The governor and General Assembly should ensure they are not inadvertently creating barriers for treatment for opioid users.”

Another recommendation calls for even greater strides in partnerships between public and private entities.

“State officials should expand partnerships with local authorities, physicians and advocacy groups and reinforce the effectiveness of medication-assisted treatment to diminish lingering stigma of its use and to adequately fund a range of MAT options in prisons, jails and recovery facilities,” the recommendation states.