HHS announces $77M in grants to curb drug addiction, prevent suicide
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced a series of new grants aimed at curbing substance abuse and preventing addiction, with $22 million going to individual communities struggling with the opioid crisis. The grants are part of a larger $77 million effort to promote mental health and suicide prevention through treatment and recovery programs.
In a statement, the agency said the funds will be distributed to beneficiaries through its Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), marking the end of August as National Substance Use Primary Prevention Month.
"Prevention is the foundation of a strong behavioral health system," SAMHSA Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary Christopher D. Carroll said. "More than $22 million of these awards will help states, tribes, and communities prevent substance use and strengthen the protective factors that we know help people thrive.”
“At the same time, these investments strengthen treatment and recovery, community behavioral health, suicide prevention, and crisis services so people can get the support they need when they need it."
Awards are broken into categories, including $22 million for substance use prevention, $23.6 million for substance use treatment and recovery, $21.8 million to support community mental health, and $9.4 million for suicide prevention.
"Every American deserves the chance to live free from addiction and the devastation of untreated mental illness," HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., said in a statement. "President Trump’s Great American Recovery is taking on these crises at their roots. We are investing in prevention, expanding access to effective treatment, strengthening crisis response, and helping communities intervene before tragedy strikes.”
The following organizations are set to receive the funds from SAMHSA:
- Strategic Prevention Framework - Partnerships for Success for Communities and Tribes - For community-based substance use prevention programs that reduce risk, strengthen resilience, promote well-being, and expand providers’ capacity to use evidence-based prevention strategies.
- Strategic Prevention Framework - Partnerships for Success for States - Supporting substance use prevention services that reduce risk, build resilience, promote well-being, and strengthen providers’ ability to implement evidence-based prevention strategies.
- Building Communities of Recovery - To help organizations connect community resources to expand long-term recovery support for people with substance use and co-occurring mental health disorders.
- Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment - With a goal to implement a public health model to screen children, adolescents, and adults for underage drinking, opioid use, and other substance use and connect those at risk to appropriate care.
- State Pilot Program for Treatment for Pregnant and Postpartum Women - For expanding access to integrated, evidence-based substance use and maternal mental health services for pregnant and postpartum women and their families.
- Behavioral Health and Community Safety Partnerships - To help communities reduce the behavioral health impacts of crime and violence, strengthen safety, and improve outcomes for affected youth, families and individuals.
- National Child Traumatic Stress Initiative – Category I, National Center for Child Traumatic Stress - In an effort to coordinate with the NCTSI network in developing and sharing resources, coordinating child trauma education and training, and improving trauma-related service systems.
- Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health - To develop evidence-based programs that promote healthy social-emotional development and address the mental health needs of infants and young children.
- 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline Crisis Center Follow-Up Programs - Funds will be used to expand efforts among 988 Lifeline crisis centers to support individuals post-contact to provide continued support and linkages to decrease suicide, deaths by overdose and future crisis events.
- Adult Suicide Prevention - For the purpose of strengthening community-based suicide prevention and early intervention through collaboration, greater awareness of resources, evidence-based care, and improved support for adults at risk.
“Our goal is clear: save lives, restore families, and help more Americans achieve lasting recovery and better health,” Kennedy added.
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