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The trial of the âBig Threeâ drug companies accused of fueling an opioid drug epidemic in Cabell County and the city of Huntington is taking place at the Robert C. Byrd U.S. Courthouse in Charleston.
Courtesy of the West Virginia Humanities Council
HUNTINGTON â After resting its months-long case in which the city of Huntington and Cabell County accused drug distributors of helping to cause the opioid crisis in the area, the municipalities faced their biggest obstacle Thursday â satisfying an inquisitive judge.
The trial stemmed from the local governmentsâ accusations against AmerisourceBergen Corp., Cardinal Health and McKesson Co., who they accuse of fueling the opioid crisis by shipping 127.9 million dosage units of opioids to the community over eight years before a reduction of shipments made people with substance use disorder turn to illicit drugs.
The distribution companies argue the Drug Enforcement Administration, doctorsâ prescribing habits and West Virginiansâ history of poor health as the reasons behind the shipments.
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HUNTINGTON â While Huntington prides itself on being a city of solutions and recovery, an expert witness at an opioid trial Monday said its resources are far from what is needed to abate the opioid crisis.
In fact, Caleb Alexander, a pharmacoepidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine who testified at the opioid trial Monday, penned an abatement plan he said would significantly improve the crisis by halving the number of overdoses, deaths and number of people with substance use disorder over the next 15 years by increasing focus on prevention, treatment, recovery and special populations.
But to put the plan into effect, the governments need stable, reliable money, which grant funding does not provide.