Bruce Blakeman: $6.8 million allocated to fighting opioid epidemic in Nassau County

Joined by various health professionals and drug treatment organizations, County Executive Bruce Blakeman announced the allocation of $6.8 million for opioid prevention, education and treatment on Monday morning in Mineola. The money will be distributed to healthcare providers in the county, as well as the Nassau County Police Department.

“Every years, tens of thousands of people die from fentanyl overdose, many of them young people,” Blakeman said.

Drug overdose deaths surged during the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, hitting a record high by the end of 2020. Many health experts say the surge was caused by fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid that is 50 times stronger than heroin.

Catholic Health Services, which is headquartered in Rockville Centre at Mercy Hospital will receive $2 million and the Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow will receive $2.5 million. The police department is slated to receive $500,000, which will allow it to purchase state-of-the-art equipment to identify fentanyl on the street.

In general, the county will also allocate $600,000 per year towards various education initiatives to inform the public about drug abuse and opioid addiction.

The county showed a public service announcement that was recently recorded, featuring Dr. Irene Gelman, the current County health commissioner and Anissa Moore, deputy commissioner for health and human services.

“These public service announcements will start off within the next couple of weeks,” Blakeman said, “which will give people in the community the opportunity to know where they can go for help, whether its treatment, counseling or any educational purpose.”

Dr. Larry Eisenstein, the former County health commissioner, and current chief public and community health officer at Catholic Health, said the healthcare network is appreciative of the funding.

“We saw that the pandemic exacerbated what was a growing problem with regard to opioid use and mental health,” he said. “One in four people in this country has a diagnosable mental health disorder.”

Catholic Health will embed primary care physician officers with social workers and case managers to screen patients, and identify in an earlier timeframe individuals who may be suffering from substance abuse, Blakeman explained. Eisenstein said the money will be used to “build a center of excellence.”

“We’re going to be growing our operations — we’re going to be adding identifying navigators to our primary care practice,” he said. “This is going to be serving Nassau County, based out of our hub at Mercy Hospital, with our new Family Health Center on the grounds of Mercy Hospital.”

Eisenstein said services will be accessible to all.

“We’re going to be making services available that if they don’t want to answer us on the spot, they know exactly where to go without barriers,” he said. “Catholic Health could not be more excited about this great opportunity — I cannot be more excited about it because preventative health has always been my life’s work.”

Blakeman said at NUMC, the county is supplementing the hospital’s mental health facilities, where it also treats individuals struggling with substance abuse.

Meg Ryan, acting chief executive officer of NUMC, said the funds are “well-needed.”

The hospital will be building outpatient rooms, bathrooms, counseling centers, conference rooms and nursing stations on its 10th floor, where there’s an inpatient mental health and addiction unit, along with making other expansions on its ground floor by the emergency room, to treat patients struggling with substance abuse and mental health disorders, Ryan explained.  

“Last year, we had 20,000 patients that went through NUMC for addiction services so with this money, we’ll be able to treat even more and help Nassau County,” Ryan said.

Nassau County has received approximately $385 million in coronavirus relief money through the federal American Rescue Plan Act, and over $92 million in settlements form opioid manufactures, distributors and retailers. 

Delia DeReggi-Whitton, the minority caucus leader for the legislator said less than $7 million of this has been spent. She called today's announcement a "disappointment."

“After two years of delays, the agencies that have been promised funding should have been paid in full, and a significant amount of additional funding should also have been released," she said. "Neither have happened.”

“To have just paid about one-seventh of our opioid funding more than two years later is an insult to every family that continues to struggle with the opioid epidemic," DeRiggi-Whitton continued. "This money cannot be used for anything else other than addressing opioid addiction, and I feel Nassau must begin distributing this funding at a pace that meets the urgency of this crisis."