First you have health care reform, which requires insurers to cover addictions at the same level they treat other health issues.

Then you have the poor economy, pushing from two directions at once: driving up the number of people who need substance abuse treatment, even as traditional public and private funding for addiction services get scarcer.

So it?s not surprising to see Phoenix House Foundation — a large, multi-state addiction treatment provider — partner with Vanguard Services Unlimited, a nearly 50-year-old substance abuse treatment provider based in the Washington D.C. area. The new organization will extend both groups’ reach and will be dubbed “Phoenix Houses of the Mid-Atlantic.”

“With passage of healthcare reform, medical providers will be able to open a door that has been closed to millions of Americans, and we plan to be on the other side of that threshold to provide best-in-class treatment and recovery programs,” said Howard Meitiner, President and CEO of Phoenix House.

What?s not clear, of course, is what will happen to the parity requirements of health reform legislation in the wake of the November elections.