Policymakers and community leaders play an important role in addressing opioids in our communities. This page highlights the most recently added resources specifically targeting elected and appointed government officials and staff members, members of the law enforcement community and first responders, and employees and volunteers of organizations. These resources, identified with orange tiles, include policy roadmaps, implementation guides, toolkits, education materials, sample legislation and other materials that can help you design and implement effective programs to prevent and address the consequences of opioid crisis.
If you’d like to submit materials for inclusion consideration or suggest a future featured topic, please visit CLOUD’s call for submissions page.
This issue brief explores syringe services programs (SSPs) and how they can improve public health. The paper describes the benefits of SSPs such as reduced rates of HIV and hepatitis C infections among people who use drugs, increases in SSP participants engagement in substance use disorder treatment, and the lack of relationship between SSP programs and increased criminal activity.
This 3 page briefing paper discusses the role legal aid services can play in helping address the impact of the opioid crisis on individuals, families, and communities.
This report details how the opioid crisis has affected the Hispanic/Latino population in the US. It includes data on opioid use in this community and a discussion of the socio-cultural factors associated with accessing services including facilitators and barriers to accessing appropriate prevention, treatment, and recovery services and supports.
The New Mexico statewide standing order authorizes registered pharmacists in the state to dispense naloxone to any person who uses an opioid, regardless of how the opioid is used or obtained, or to any person in a position to assist a person at risk of experiencing an opioid overdose.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that federal funding may be used to purchase rapid fentanyl test strips (FTS). FTS can be used to determine if drugs have been cut or mixed with fentanyl which greatly increases the risk of overdose death.
In April 2021, the FDA announced approval of an application for a produce to deliver an 8 milligram (mg) dose of naloxone; previous approvals had been granted for products delivering 2 mg and 4 mg of naloxone. The approval was granted to provide an additional option for the treatment of opioid overdose.
This resource supports successful planning, design, implementation, and sustainability of syringe service programs (SSPs). The document describes 5 main strategies for SSP implementation and service delivery that are know to be effective:
This document produced by the Florida Department of Health provides a list of resources to support syringe exchange programs as part of implementation of the Florida Infectious Disease Elimination Act.
This 2 page fact sheet explains the state of Florida’s Infectious Disease Elimination Act (IDEA), which allowed counties in the state to establish syringe exchange programs for people who use drugs. The resource describes the problem IDEA is intended to solve, explains the legislation, and describes the benefits of syringe exchange programs.
This site details the state of Florida’s Infectious Disease Elimination Act (IDEA). In 2019, Florida passed a law allowing county commissions to authorize sterile needle and syringe exchange programs for people who inject drugs in order to reduce opioid overdose rates and prevent infectious diseases such as HIV and hepatitis B and C.