Because the opioid epidemic continues to grip Maine, a survey launched Tuesday exhibits that Mainers help prioritizing therapy for individuals who use medication over punishment and incarceration, which advocates and medical consultants have lengthy argued doesn’t work.
The survey, developed by College of Maine professors Robert Glover and Karyn Sporer and put into the sector in the summertime of 2021, discovered that 74% of individuals help decriminalizing medication by diverting folks with substance use dysfunction out of the legal justice system for low-level non-violent offenses and towards community-based applications that assist with restoration. Assist was seen no matter get together affiliation within the survey.
The ballot was administered on-line to 417 Mainers throughout demographic strains from July to August of 2021. The margin of error is 4.8% with a 95% confidence degree.
The findings — that are the first-ever complete survey of Mainers’ views on drug coverage — comes because the state continues to battle with the overdose epidemic. Maine skilled a report variety of overdose deaths in 2021 — 636 — and is on tempo to surpass that quantity by the tip of this 12 months, in line with information from the primary 5 months of 2022.
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On condition that state of affairs, advocates have continued to argue that the decades-long “Conflict on Medicine” technique of incarcerating individuals who use substances clearly hasn’t labored and has resulted in deaths that might have been prevented. In a direct problem to that punitive strategy, the Maine restoration group in 2021 superior LD 967, a invoice to decriminalize medication and focus as a substitute on therapy applications. The measure handed the Home however died within the state Senate amid opposition from Republicans and a few Democrats, together with Gov. Janet Mills. As seen by the survey, although, a powerful majority of Mainers help diverting individuals who use medication away from the legal justice system, as known as for by LD 967.
In 2022, the restoration group continued to suggest reforms and succeeded in pushing a invoice by way of the legislature that strengthened the state’s “Good Samaritan regulation,” which supplies protections for folks on the scene of an overdose. After some negotiations, Mills signed the invoice into regulation. Supporters of the hassle to broaden Maine’s Good Samaritan regulation | Beacon
Together with an total emphasis on restoration, the UMaine professors’ survey additionally discovered an amazing majority of Mainers help funding easy-to-access detox companies in each county (84%), decreasing limitations to accessing substance use therapy (84%), establishing treatment assisted therapy in each county (77%), increasing entry to case administration companies (84%), and funding native restoration group facilities (84%).
There was additionally robust help (73%) for guaranteeing that folks in jails and prisons nonetheless have entry to therapy for substance use dysfunction.
Researchers mentioned the outcomes of the survey exhibits Mainers are prepared for a special strategy to drug use.
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“We noticed actually placing help for options to criminalization,” Glover mentioned throughout a press convention Tuesday wherein he and Sporer offered their findings.
“Mainers, no matter political affiliation, schooling, employment, faith — all these demographics — they need a brand new drug coverage strategy. It’s very clear within the information,” Sporer added.
Glover and Sporer famous that regardless of this robust help, policymakers in Maine have typically lagged behind public opinion on medication, with Glover noting the Mills administration’s opposition to the drug decriminalization invoice in 2021. Mills’ opponent within the upcoming November election, former Gov. Paul LePage, took a good tougher stance on medication throughout his time in workplace, vetoing an array of opioid therapy payments.
“There’s this hesitancy amongst lawmakers of all stripes to essentially embrace a special strategy to this coverage problem, and there doesn’t essentially should be,” Glover mentioned. “Mainers by and huge, with some notable exceptions, would help a broad suite of reforms that transfer away from the criminalizing strategy.”
Glover additionally famous that different locations, resembling Oregon, have decriminalized small quantities of medicine by way of referendum fairly than through the legislature, a technique that might probably discover help in Maine, given the outcomes of the survey.
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Survey finds help for some hurt discount insurance policies, hesitancy about others
Additional questions requested about Mainers’ opinions on hurt discount methods. The ballot discovered {that a} robust majority of individuals within the state (76%) help combating the opioid epidemic by way of broad distribution of overdose reversals resembling narcan. A plurality (49%) additionally again funding syringe change in each county in Maine, with somewhat over 30% opposing such a coverage.
Nonetheless, just below half of survey respondents mentioned they might oppose safer drug consumption websites in each main metropolitan space in Maine. Such websites, which have been proven to avoid wasting lives, are designated areas the place folks can use pre-approved medication underneath medical supervision. A little bit underneath a 3rd of individuals mentioned they might help safer consumption websites in cities in Maine and practically 20% had been impartial on the query.
Nonetheless, Glover mentioned help for a treatment-based strategy to drug use has grown steadily through the years, elevating the chance that protected consumption websites may improve in recognition as the general public learns extra about them.
“I feel that’s the subsequent horizon,” he mentioned of such websites.
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“Thirty two p.c of our respondents supporting safer consumption websites is definitely fairly placing,” Glover added. “If we had been to ask this query 10 years in the past, it most likely would have been loads much less. So I feel what we see is that as publicity to the disaster will increase, as schooling and understanding will increase, we’ll proceed to see these shifts in public attitudes.”
Further questions discovered a majority of Mainers (59%) again strengthening the social security internet to deal with root causes of substance use dysfunction; help requiring the gathering of data on race, ethnicity and socio-economic standing for interactions between regulation enforcement and the general public (53%); and need to broaden non-discrimination insurance policies to incorporate folks with substance use dysfunction (57%).
Survey contains interview portion
Together with the polling, the survey by Glover and Sporer additionally contained “in-depth semi-structured interviews with 30 policymakers, therapy suppliers, and impacted group members.”
From the interviews, Sporer mentioned researchers found that the first causes for the shift in public help towards therapy are schooling about substance use, private publicity to the problem, and an acknowledgement that there are a number of pathways to restoration.
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Within the survey, one respondent — recognized as Gina, a 61-year-old Republican advisor — informed researchers that she used to consider in a tough-on-crime response to medication however ultimately modified her thoughts after listening to from a medical skilled who talked about how substance use dysfunction is a well being problem.
“He helped flip my thoughts from legal justice, it’s against the law, we now have to punish them, they’re unhealthy folks to, no, it is a illness the place we now have to assist these folks,” Gina mentioned within the survey.
One other respondent, recognized as Patrick — a 63-year-old medical physician and a Democrat — mentioned witnessing the toll of the opioid epidemic has spurred him to help all types of hurt discount, together with protected consumption websites.
“The children that my youngsters grew up with in a really small faculty system, every of them has a number of classmates who’re lifeless, because of this,” he mentioned within the survey. “Both overdose, suicide, murder, drug associated automotive accidents, issues like that. That’s emotionally very impactful.”
High photograph: Supporters of the invoice to decriminalize medication rally on the State Home in 2021 | Beacon
Health experts and advocates are prioritizing a wide range of issues in the upcoming legislative session, spanning from the tobacco tax and artificial intelligence protections to measures that address children’s behavioral health, medical cannabis and workforce shortages.
Matt Wellington, associate director of the Maine Public Health Association, said his organization will push to increase the tobacco tax, which he said has not been increased in 20 years, in order to fund efforts to reduce rates of cancer.
Maine has a higher cancer incidence rate than the national average, yet one of the lowest tobacco taxes in the region.
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“One in three Mainers will face a cancer diagnosis in their lifetime,” Wellington said. “We’re putting a big emphasis on educating lawmakers about all of the tools at our disposal to prevent cancer and to reduce the incidence of cancer in our state.”
MPHA also supports efforts to update landlord-tenant regulations to create safer housing that can handle extreme weather events and high heat days by requiring air conditioning and making sure water damage is covered to prevent mold.
Wellington also emphasized expanding the breadth of issues local boards of health are allowed to weigh in on beyond the current scope of nuisance issues such as rodents, and establishing a testing, tracking and tracing requirementfor the medical cannabis program.
Dr. Henk Goorhuis, co-chair of the Maine Medical Association legislative committee, said he is concerned about the use of artificial intelligence in denial of prior authorizations by health insurance companies and said there are some steps the state could take.
Both Goorhuis and Dr. Scott Hanson, MMA president, emphasized stronger gun safety protections.
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“The Maine Medical Association, and the Maine Gun Safety Coalition and the American Academy of Pediatricians … we’re all not convinced that Maine’s system is as good as it can be,” Hanson said.
Goorhuis added that while he thinks Maine has made progress on reproductive autonomy, it will be important to watch what could happen at the federal level and whether there will be repercussions here in Maine.
Jess Maurer, executive director of the Maine Council on Aging, and Arthur Phillips, the economic policy analyst with the Maine Center for Economic Policy, both said they are working on an omnibus bill to grow the essential care and support workforce and close gaps in care.
Maurer said this bill will include a pay raise for Mainers caring for older adults and people with intellectual and physical disabilities; an effort to study gaps in care; the use of technology to monitor how people are getting care; and the creation of a universal worker credential.
Phillips said he hopes lawmakers will pursue reimbursement for wages at 140 percent of minimum wage. A report he published this summer estimated that the state needs an additional 2,300 full-time care workers, and called for the Medicaid reimbursement rate for direct care to be increased.
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Maurer said Area Agencies on Aging are “overburdened” with demand for services and at least three have waitlists for Meals on Wheels. She is pushing for a bill that would increase funding for these agencies and the services they provide.
John Brautigam, with Legal Services for Maine Elders, said his organization is focused on making sure the Medicare Savings Program expansion is implemented as intended.
He’s following consumer protection initiatives, including those relating to medical debt collection, and supports the proposed regulations for assisted housing programs, which will go to lawmakers this session.
Brautigam said he’s also advocating for legislation that will protect older Mainers’ housing, adequate funding for civil legal service providers and possible steps to restructure the probate court system to bring it in line with the state’s other courts.
Jeffrey Austin, vice president of government affairs for the Maine Hospital Association, said he’s focused on protecting the federal 340B program, which permits eligible providers, such as nonprofit hospitals and federally qualified health centers, to purchase certain drugs at a discount.
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Austin said this program is crucial for serving certain populations, including the uninsured, but the pharmaceutical industry has been trying to “erode” the program. Maine hospitals lost roughly $75 million last year due to challenges to the program, he said.
Katie Fullam Harris, chief government affairs officer for MaineHealth, also highlighted protecting 340B. She said that although it’s a federal program, there are some steps Maine could take to protect it at a local level, as other states have done.
Both Austin and Harris said there is more work to be done on providing behavioral health services for children so they aren’t stuck in hospital emergency rooms or psychiatric units. Harris said there will potentially be multiple bills that aim to increase in-home support systems and create more residential capacity.
Austin said there’s a second aspect of Mainers getting stuck in hospitals: older adults with nowhere to be discharged. Improving the long-term care eligibility process will make this more effective. For example, there’s currently a mileage limit on how far away someone can be placed in long-term care, but that’s no longer realistic due to nursing home closures, he said.
This story was originally published by The Maine Monitor, a nonprofit civic news organization. To get regular coverage from the Monitor, sign up for a free Monitor newsletter here.
River otters are members of the weasel family, and are equally comfortable on land or in the water.
They probably are the most fun mammal Maine has, just because they like to play. But their play antics have a more serious purpose too. They teach their young survival skills, and hone their own, that way.
You will see them slide down riverbanks and muddy or snowy hills, wrestle with each other, bellyflop, somersault or juggle rocks while lying on their backs, according to the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute.
The otters in this video courtesy of Colin Chase have found a fun log to include in their games.
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Otters are social creatures but usually live alone in pairs. Parents raise two or three kits that are born in spring in a den near a river or stream, the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife website says.
They primarily eat fish, but also shellfish, crayfish and sometimes turtles, snakes, muskrats and small beavers, according to the MDIF&W.
Otters can swim up to a quarter mile under water, and their noses and ears close while they are submerged. They also have a membrane that closes over their eyes so they can see better under water, the Smithsonian said.
They are mostly nocturnal so it’s a treat to see them during the day, playing or hunting for food.
Maine State Police responded to more than 50 crashes and road slide-offs Saturday after southern Maine woke up to some light snowfall.
Police were responding to several crashes on the Maine Turnpike (Interstate 95) and Interstate 295 south of Augusta, state police said in a Facebook message posted around 10 a.m. Saturday.
Maine State Police spokesperson Shannon Moss said that as of early Saturday afternoon, more than 50 crashes had been reported on the turnpike and I-295.
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“The Turnpike has seen 24 crashes and slide offs primarily between Kittery and Falmouth with a higher concentration in Saco,” Moss wrote in an email. “The interstate has seen about 30 crashes and slide offs also in the Falmouth area but now in Lincoln and heading north.”
Moss said no injuries have been reported in any of the crashes.
“So far it appears visibility and driving too fast for road conditions are the causation factors,” Moss said.
State police reminded drivers to take caution, especially during snowy conditions, in the Facebook post.
“Please drive with extra care and give yourself plenty of space between you and the other vehicles on the roadway,” the post said. “Give the MDOT and Turnpike plows extra consideration and space to do their jobs to clear the roadway. Drive slow, plan for the extra time to get to your destination and be safe.”
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