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    Opioid crisis emergency renewed by HHS

    By Robyn Oster
    March 2025

    The main point: Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kennedy renewed the public health emergency declaration addressing the opioid crisis.

    The details:

    • The opioid crisis was first declared a public health emergency in 2017, during Trump’s first administration. It has been renewed in 90-day increments since.
    • The declaration gives HHS expanded authority to respond to the crisis, including making grants, entering into contracts, and conducting and supporting investigations into the cause, treatment, and prevention of opioid use disorder.
    • HHS has relied on the declaration to facilitate information collection, expedite demonstration projects related to addiction treatment, and expedite support for research on opioid use disorder treatments.

    Kennedy said:

    “Although overdose deaths are starting to decline, opioid-involved overdoses remain the leading cause of drug-related fatalities. This Administration is going to treat this urgent crisis in American health as the national security emergency that it is. Renewing the Opioid Public Health Emergency Declaration affirms the Administration’s commitment to addressing the opioid overdose crisis and is one of many critical steps we will take to Make America Healthy Again.”

    But: So far, the administration has largely been responding to the opioid crisis as a law enforcement/border issue, not a health crisis.

    • It has imposed tariffs in an attempt to stop fentanyl trafficking, while cutting and threatening cuts to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and Medicaid, which facilitate the health care response to the crisis.

    Read more: RFK Jr. extends opioid public health emergency (Politico); Trump administration extends opioid emergency as fentanyl deaths drop (NPR)