Urgency needed in opioid epidemic

There is no sugar coating it: The opioid epidemic is bad in Tennessee and getting worse by the year.

The number of overdose deaths has exploded by more than 300 percent over the past two decades.

Nearly 1,500 people died in 2015, and the state earned the ill-fated distinction of having the second-highest rate of prescriptions per capita in the nation.

More babies are being born drug dependent, and communities, from the east to the middle to the west of the state, are reeling.

The demand for solutions and accountability is growing louder. While there are local, state and national efforts to stem the tide, they still are not enough to tame what is Tennessee’s No. 1 public health crisis — taking a grave economic, societal and emotional toll on families.

A USA TODAY NETWORK–Tennessee forum in Knoxville on Tuesday brought in numerous people, many heartbroken because they had lost or were desperate to get help for a loved one. The message from panelists — something echoed in a similar panel held in Nashville last summer — was that there should be no one-size-fits-all approach and that addiction must be treated medically not criminally.

That is a message that federal and state political leaders must hear, heed and act upon. It is promising that the Trump administration announced on Wednesday the creation of a new opioid addiction commission, led by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

The concern is whether the commission will be more inclined to pursue a law-and-order approach versus a treatment approach. The latter was finally endorsed by Congress in legislation passed last year though medical professionals have treated addiction like a disease for some time.

One-third of the United States’ population lives with chronic pain, and medication is sometimes the answer.

However, will the commission hold medical professionals accountable for administering pain killers responsibly? And will it examine pharmaceutical companies’ role in creating effective, but highly addictive, drugs that helped get us into this mess?

Health, law enforcement and community leaders are also concerned about uncertainty in funding, given deep proposed cuts to domestic spending, in areas like health care and research.

Then, there is the issue of access. So many people afflicted by addiction do not have or cannot afford insurance to seek and complete treatment.

This speaks to the broader failure of Tennessee lawmakers not to expand health insurance coverage to 400,000 working poor individuals over the past two years and Congress’ failure in March to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Congressional House Republicans voted more than 60 times over the past seven years to repeal ACA, but did not even take a vote this year. They simply moved on.

This will not be an easy problem to solve, but we must have the resolve to continue to fight and serve the needs of those who most need help.

This editorial was written by editorial board of The Tennessean, a sister publication of The Commercial Appeal and a fellow member of the USA TODAY Network – Tennessee