FAIRMONT, W.Va. — The nonprofit established to redistribute opioid settlement funds within the Mountain State has announced a new collaboration involving a half-dozen higher education institutions.
Officials with the West Virginia First Foundation announced Monday that the organization has agreed to a data collection partnership with West Virginia University, Marshall University, the University of Charleston, West Virginia Wesleyan, as well as Johns Hopkins University and the University of Notre Dame.
Foundation Executive Director Jonathan Board was joined by presidents of four of those institutions as part of the announcement at the Mollihan Research Center, along with Gov. Patrick Morrisey and U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of West Virginia Matt Harvey.
“I think it’s always wonderful when you can get a higher education engaged and help fight the substance abuse epidemic with data and with best practices,” said Morrisey.
The six universities a part of the partnership will each contribute a different level of data associated with respective programs run by their own institution. WVU will contribute data gathered as part of the Health Affairs Institute’s West Virginia Wayfinder, with Marshall contributing addiction research gathered as part of programs such as Center of Excellence and Recovery.
The University of Charleston will contribute data as part of a target distribution plan of naloxone, with West Virginia Wesleyan contributing data gathered through supported counseling programs. Johns Hopkins and Notre Dame will contribute data evaluation and grant-making guidance.
“We need data, we need the information that comes from deep research to tell us not only from a dollar to a success, but what that travel is and where the success lies every step of the way,” said Board. “And that’s what today is all about.”
Board noted that each of the institutions reached out to the West Virginia First Foundation to contribute data to allow for the partnership to take shape. For select institutions, the data was gathered over the course of several years as part of programs that were established due to local effects seen as a result of the opioid crisis.
“On August 15, 2016, it was a dark day in West Virginia and in Huntington, where we had 28 overdoses in a four-hour period, but we seized that moment, and now we are actually leading the way with a continuum of care,” said Smith on what prompted Marshall’s involvement. “That’s become the blueprint for the rest of the nation on how to navigate through substance use disorder.”
Morrisey noted the efforts taken by Board and other officials within the West Virginia First Foundation to continue to build on the nonprofit he helped establish back when he was serving as State Attorney General.
In his address to those in attendance for the announcement, he said that approximately $150 million has been distributed from the over $1 billion in opioid settlement funds in less than five years, with plans for the legislature to now get involved in distributing the funds in different aspects of the Mountain State. Those are efforts he feels will be greatly benefited from the data-driven collaboration.
“The fact that you have these universities in West Virginia coming together, along with Notre Dame and Johns Hopkins, the fight against substance abuse problems gets even stronger today,” said Morrisey.