This free employer kit is designed to address prescription drug use in the workplace and includes: a guide, “The Proactive Role Employers Can Take: Opioids in the Workplace;” tools to evaluate an organization’s employee benefit plans used to stem addiction; fact sheets and handouts to educate employees; a set of safety talks that management can deliver to employees; and a poster series for display about home safety and disposal of prescription drugs.

This research report from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation outlines the geography of the opioid epidemic and the correlation between opioid use and higher rates of poverty and unemployment.

This infographic from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services provides a brief identification of key data points on the history and status of the opioid epidemic.

Massachusetts leads the way in providing social workers the resources they need to combat the opioid crisis. The Governor created a Social Work Education Working Group on Substance Misuse, which has partnered with the National Association of Social Workers and local social work graduate schools to develop a unified framework for caseworkers to manage substance abuse. This report outlines the core principles of their strategy, which will be implemented statewide in social work curriculum. The guidelines include the Primary Prevention Domain of Preventing Substance Misuse, the Secondary Prevention Domain of Caring for Individuals At-Risk for Substance Use Disorders, and the Tertiary Prevention Domain of Managing Substance Use Disorders as a Chronic Disease. Within these three realms, the working group lists subareas of focus. This outline can be used as an example for other states or practitioners looking to develop supportive and standardized curriculum for those on the front lines of the opioid epidemic.

This report from the White House Council of Economic Advisers documents the data on the opioid crisis from a public health standpoint and the economic costs of opioid-related fatalities at the macro level.

The National Center for Health Statistics presents a data visualization, drawn from the National Vital Statistics System, for drug overdose deaths for all 50 states and the District of Columbia. This data series compares the percentage changes in provisional drug overdose deaths in the current 12 month period with the previous 12 months. There is also data to indicate the reported and predicted provisional counts by month.

This journal article presents data to illustrate how the death rate from opioids among Native Americans has risen significantly over the last 17 years. The authors also discuss tribal medical and legal responses to the opioid epidemic, including tribally-operated medication assisted therapies and drug diversion courts.

This Urban Institute policy brief reviews the extent that children’s negative behavioral outcomes continue after their fathers have been released from incarceration. The brief compares negative outcomes, such as outward displays of aggression or internalized expressions, including withdrawal or anxiety, among children when their fathers are incarcerated and when they are released with outcomes of those children whose fathers have never been incarcerated.

Greater awareness of the opioid epidemic and its impact on participants and employer partners as well as on workforce service delivery is needed. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration hosted a webinar on October 18, 2018 to discuss Federal efforts to support communities in addressing workforce challenges associated with the opioid crisis. Participants learned about the Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) approach to the delivery of early intervention and treatment for people with substance use disorders and those at risk of developing these disorders.

The continuing opioid crisis is a major public health issue, and it extends across the domains of public assistance programs and workforce development as well. This report by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reviews the medication-assisted treatment initiatives that five case study states have undertaken to identify effective practices in offering and expanding treatment. In addition, the authors discuss financing and workforce policies from which policymakers can draw. Potentially effective “policy levers” across states include expanding Medicaid services for medical treatment, using targeted grant funds, creating hubs of care, and instituting stigma-reducing programs.