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<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" color="#000099" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size:12.0pt"><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-house-announces-new-steps-to-combat-heroin-prescription-drug-abuse/2015/10/21/e454f8fa-7800-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html">https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-house-announces-new-steps-to-combat-heroin-prescription-drug-abuse/2015/10/21/e454f8fa-7800-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html</a></span><o:p></o:p></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" color="#000099" face="Times New Roman"><o:p> </o:p></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:8.05pt;line-height:37.2pt"><b><font size="7" color="#333333" face="FranklinITCProBold"><span style="font-size:32.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProBold;color:#333333;font-weight:bold">White House announces new steps to
combat heroin, prescription drug abuse<o:p></o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext">Resize Text</span></font><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext"><o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext">Print Article</span></font><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext"><o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext"><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-house-announces-new-steps-to-combat-heroin-prescription-drug-abuse/2015/10/21/e454f8fa-7800-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html"><font size="3" color="#2e6d9d" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none"><o:p></o:p></span></font></a></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><font size="1" color="#2e6d9d" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:#2E6D9D"><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-house-announces-new-steps-to-combat-heroin-prescription-drug-abuse/2015/10/21/e454f8fa-7800-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html"><font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">Comments</span></font><font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">
</span></font><font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">1</span></font><font size="3" color="black" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";color:windowtext;text-decoration:none"><o:p></o:p></span></font></a></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><a name="b9daf0db743f9be869421904bd50224b8278f94c"></a><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext"><img border="0" width="423" height="262" id="Picture_x0020_1" src="cid:image001.jpg@01D10C13.720A88E0" alt="https://img.washingtonpost.com/rf/image_1484w/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2015/10/01/Local-Politics/Images/AP2946165480841402072930-691.jpg?uuid=9haA9mhZEeWe8_3hglB-rA"></span></font><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext"><br>
</span></font><font size="1" color="#6e6e6e" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:#6E6E6E">FILE: A kit with naloxone, also known by its brand name Narcan, is displayed at the South Jersey AIDS Alliance
in Atlantic City, N.J. (AP Photo/Mel Evans) (Mel Evans/AP)</span></font><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext">
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:12.0pt"><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext">By
<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/steven-mufson"><font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">Steven Mufson</span></font></a> and
<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/katie-zezima"><font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">Katie Zezima</span></font></a></span></font><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext">
</span></font><font size="1" color="#b2b2b2" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:7.0pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:#B2B2B2">October 21 at 1:40 PM</span></font><font size="1" color="black" face="FranklinITCProLight"><span style="font-size:8.5pt;font-family:FranklinITCProLight;color:windowtext">
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">CHARLESTON, W. Va. — Faced with a nationwide epidemic of heroin and
prescription drug abuse, the Obama administration announced Wednesday it will take steps to increase access to drug treatment and the training of doctors who prescribe opiate painkillers.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The efforts, which President Obama will discuss at a forum here, are
likely to have a modest effect on the steep increase in heroin and prescription drug overdoses, which now kill more people than car accidents each year, and the barriers to treatment that many addicts face.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The administration hopes to double the number of doctors who can prescribe
buprenorphine, a drug used to treat opiate addiction, to 60,000 from 30,000 over the next three years. More than 40 medical provider groups have committed to training more than a half million doctors, dentists and others on the safe prescription of opiate
medications. <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Obama’s announcement will “underscore his sense of urgency that we
at the federal level can do more to address this issue,” said Michael Botticelli, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><i><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext;font-style:italic">[<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/drug-czar-approaches-challenge-from-a-different-angle-as-a-recovering-alcoholic/2014/08/26/fa518dd0-2883-11e4-958c-268a320a60ce_story.html"><font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">Drug
czar approaches challenge from a different angle: As a recovering alcoholic</span></font></a>]</span></font></i><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Wednesday’s announcement is part of a broader effort to try to fight
opiate addiction and crack down on the overprescribing of powerful prescription drugs. There has been a steep increase in the number of heroin overdoses nationwide, with the number of deaths from the drug
<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2015/07/07/heroin-deaths-have-quadrupled-in-the-past-decade/">
<font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">quadrupling in the past decade</span></font></a>. Many who abuse heroin progressed to it after using prescription painkillers.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The administration this year proposed $133 million in new spending
to curb overprescribing, increase the amount of overdose data collected and expand access to Naloxone, a drug that can reverse the effects of an opiate overdose. In August, the administration announced an initiative to
<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-heroin-fight-white-house-tries-to-break-down-walls-between-public-health-police/2015/08/16/f63d63c2-4425-11e5-8ab4-c73967a143d3_story.html">
<font color="#2e6d9d"><span style="color:#2E6D9D;text-decoration:none">pair drug enforcement officers with public health workers</span></font></a> to trace the route of heroin, and it tightened prescribing rules for a popular powerful painkiller.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Wednesday’s announcement will also double the number of providers that
can prescribe Naloxone. Additionally, CVS will expand the number of states where its pharmacies will dispense Naloxone without a prescription, and Rite Aid will train 6,000 pharmacists on Naloxone use over the next year.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Despite the announcements, many barriers still remain to treatment,
with many addicts unable to access the help they need because of insurance rejections or overburdened facilities.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The Affordable Care Act requires insurers to treat addiction like any
other medical condition. But that portion of the law only went into effect for many insurance plans in January. In an interview earlier this year, Botticelli said the administration is investigating complaints of declined coverage, higher co-pays and reimbursement
limits.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Botticelli is a champion of using opiate drugs including buprenorphine
for medication-assisted treatment, a practice that is controversial. The drugs are prescribed by a doctor who monitors the patient and tapers the dosage of the drugs, eventually weaning the person off opiates.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The administration plans to expand a pilot program where medication-assisted
treatment is offered to people in jail. The corrections system typically does not offer treatment, forcing people to detox in jail. They often relapse after being released. The White House has also made drug court funding contingent on the court offering medication-assisted
treatment. <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">“That doesn’t make sense to me, just sending out more medication-assisted
treatment,” Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Pa.) said in an interview earlier this year. <o:p>
</o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The Department of Health and Human Services plans to additionally change
the rules on medication-assisted treatment; currently doctors can only prescribe to 30 patients in the first year after being approved to dispense the medications, and they are now capped at 100 patients.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">The administration is working to take a federal approach to an issue
that is often tackled at the state level. Many states have made it easier to access Naloxone as a way to curb the number of overdose deaths. The drug has saved many lives and some states have made it available without a prescription. But some treatment advocates
are leery of relying too much on the drug, which saves lives but doesn’t steer addicts away from heroin.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Here in West Virginia, a law passed earlier this year allows emergency
responders, medical personnel and friends and family members of addicts to administer Naloxone. West Virginia — the home of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell — is the epicenter of America’s opiate epidemic, where more than a decade ago people
started getting hooked on prescription drugs.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">According to the Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Johnson
Foundation, West Virginia has the highest rate of drug overdose deaths in the country — 33.5 per 100,000 people — accounting for more than one-third of the state’s overall injury deaths,
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">On a side street near the Roosevelt Neighborhood Center where Obama
was scheduled to speak, the leaders of some local social service groups said they could use even more support from Washington.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Standing in front of a group of blue plastic kindergarten chairs on
a grassy lawn, Carey Jo Grace, a community organizer with Our Children Our Future Campaign, said that at least one of the 30 chairs held a child who would eventually die of a drug overdose. Obama, she said, “has the power to do something about it with the
stroke of a pen.” She said that West Virginia needs more money for rehabilitation programs. West Virginia’s Department of Health and Human Resources estimates that the state has about 60,000 people in need of treatment competing for just 750 beds.
<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">“There are people who need to drive hours if their name comes up on
a waiting list,” she said. <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">“More funds for treatment is just critical,” said the Rev. Jeff Allen,
head of the West Virginia Council of Churches. But, he added, pastors had to do more to “change the culture of churches to take away any shame so people can turn to their pastors and congregations.”<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:9.0pt;line-height:16.8pt"><font size="2" color="black" face="Georgia"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Georgia","serif";color:windowtext">Marc Fisher in Washington contributed to this story.
</span></font><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" color="navy" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">Deborah L. DeBiasi</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><b><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy;font-weight:bold">Email: Deborah.DeBiasi@deq.virginia.gov</span></font></b><b><i><font size="2" color="red"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:red;font-weight:bold;font-style:italic"><br>
</span></font></i></b><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">WEB site address:
<a href="http://www.deq.virginia.gov/">www.deq.virginia.gov</a></span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">Virginia Department of Environmental Quality</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">Office of Water Permits
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">Industrial Pretreatment/Whole Effluent Toxicity (WET) Program</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">PPCPs, EDCs, and Microconstituents<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" color="navy" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><a href="http://www.deq.virginia.gov/Programs/Water/PermittingCompliance/PollutionDischargeElimination/Microconstituents.aspx">http://www.deq.virginia.gov/Programs/Water/PermittingCompliance/PollutionDischargeElimination/Microconstituents.aspx</a></span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy"><o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" color="navy" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">Mail: P.O. Box 1105, Richmond, VA 23218</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">Location: 629 E. Main Street, Richmond, VA 23219</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:navy"><br>
</span></font><font size="2" color="navy"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:navy">PH: 804-698-4028 FAX: 804-698-4032<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" color="#000099" face="Times New Roman"><o:p> </o:p></font></p>
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