Kansas & Missouri getting more than $30 million to fight opioid crisis

KANSAS/MISSOURI (KCTV) - The Biden administration early Friday morning announced $1.5 billion in nationwide funding to help states fight the opioid crisis.

Of that total, Kansas is slated to receive $8.3 million, while Missouri will net $25.3 million.

On the Kansas side, that grant money will go to the state’s Department For Aging and Disability Services, and will provide access to medication-assisted opioid treatment.

The goal is to help reduce overdose deaths for Kansans with opioid use disorder or stimulant use disorder, specifically focused on the use of prescription opioids, heroin, fentanyl and psychostimulants. The funds will go toward evidence-based prevention, treatment and recovery-support services.

On the Missouri side, the money will go toward the state’s Department of Health, which will use the funds to build upon prevention, treatment, recovery and harm-reduction strategies implemented by Missouri’s targeted response and state opioid response grants.

The state will largely use the money to target substance misuse in high-risk youth and young adults. This includes things like peer outreach and community-based street outreach programs, partnerships with infectious disease programs in high-need communities, and prevention and NARCAN training.

Missouri will also use it to distribute fentanyl test strips as a harm-reduction tool.

This issue hits close to home for the Kansas City area, which has seen several young people overdose from opioids recently, including four Oak Grove High Schoolers since the start of the school year.

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