The state of New York plans to give some state prisoners the opiate-treatment drug Suboxone to help them stay off heroin upon release, the New York Daily News reported Oct. 24.

Suboxone was created to treat opioid dependence, and is the first such drug that physicians can prescribe. It contains buprenorphine — an opioid — and naloxone, which blocks the opioid high. Used correctly, Suboxone can cut patients' drug cravings without getting them high. However, it can be addictive and is sold illegally on the street. 

The state of New York created the “Medication Support Recovery Project” to help released inmates stay off heroin. Inmates who have been drug-free since their arrest may be included.

“Research shows if you're off opiates, the brain still causes cravings,” said Jennifer Farrell of the state Office of Alcohol and Substance Abuse Services. “Inmates who are opiate-dependent are more at risk of overdosing. When they're released, the brain is craving it, but they no longer have the tolerance for the amount they used to take.”

The Suboxone program will be piloted in one state prison to opiate-dependent inmates identified by a “controlled screening process,” Farrell said. Treatment would start three months before they were scheduled to leave prison. Upon release, they would be given a renewable prescription.

Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan opposed the plan. “Hooking inmates on an addictive opiate drug as they're about to be released from prison sounds like a poorly thought-out policy,” she said. “It's asking for trouble to put a drug that people want to buy into the hands of prisoners reentering society.”

An anonymous treatment counselor interviewed by the Daily News agreed with Brennan. He said released prisoners would risk re-arrest because “they will be selling some of their prescription.”

Illegal Suboxone sales grew from 59 in 2007 to 287 in 2009, according to the New York Police Department.