opioid epidemic

The local governments suing drug companies over the opioid crisis have not reached a settlement in the more than 1,800 lawsuits pending in federal court in Cleveland.

But attorneys for the plaintiffs are proposing a way to divide up any settlement dollars among — possibly — all cities and counties across the country. The attorneys are asking Judge Dan Polster to approve the plan at a June 25 hearing. All Things Considered host Tony Ganzer spoke with ideastream’s Nick Castele about the cases, the proposal and if a settlement is likely.

In the 25 years since she snorted her first line of methamphetamine at a club in San Francisco, Kim has redefined "normal" many times. At first, she says, it seemed like meth brought her back to her true self — the person she was before her parents divorced, and before her stepfather moved in.

"I felt normal when I first did it, like, 'Oh! There I am,' " she says.

Dayton, hard hit by the opioid crisis, is battling back. The latest help comes from a Google Alphabet company called Verily, which is piloting an addiction treatment program it may scale nationwide.

In his 40 years of working with people who struggle with addiction, David Crowe has seen various drugs fade in and out of popularity in Pennsylvania's Crawford County.

Methamphetamine use and distribution is a major challenge for the rural area, says Crowe, the executive director of Crawford County Drug and Alcohol Executive Commission. And opioid-related overdoses have killed at least 83 people in the county since 2015, he says.

Drug dealers are increasingly supplying their crack cocaine and ecstasy users with drugs tainted with fentanyl. According to the Hamilton County Heroin Coalition Task Force, that is causing a rash of overdose deaths.

As the opioid epidemic continues, hospitals are looking for new ways to treat pain and combat addiction. At Indiana University Health, which has 16 hospitals across the state, that means change. They’re cutting back on opioid prescriptions and giving more advice to patients.

The city of Green in Summit County will equip hotels with Narcan, the naloxone nasal spray drug that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose, in a program believed the be the first of its kind in the United States. 

Mayor Gerard Neugebauer says the need rose from a disproportionate number of overdoses along Interstate 77.

Updated at 6:50 p.m. ET:

The first case in a flood of litigation against opioid drug manufacturers opened on Tuesday in Oklahoma.

Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter's suit alleges Johnson & Johnson, the nation's largest drugmaker, helped ignite a public health crisis that has killed thousands of state residents.

Johnson & Johnson is the sole defendant in the case after two other companies — Teva Pharmaceuticals and Purdue Pharma — both settled with the state before the trial began.

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong has a skin condition called rosacea, and he says he takes the antibiotic doxycycline once a day for it.

In 2013, the average market price of doxycycline rose from $20 to $1,829 a year later. That's an increase of over 8,000%.

White drug users addicted to heroin, fentanyl and other opioids have had near exclusive access to buprenorphine, a drug that curbs the craving for opioids and reduces the chance of a fatal overdose. That's according to a study out Wednesday from the University of Michigan.