Mayor Paul Soglin and Dane County Executive Joe Parisi announced a joint comprehensive plan Wednesday to address the rising number of heroin and prescription drug overdoses in the county.
The City of Madison and Dane County plan to coordinate multiple task forces to combat the county's drug and opiate ""epidemic,"" including finding the best treatment practices as well as the strongest ways to hinder drug distribution and violence.
""Both the county and the city faced difficult budgets, but the Mayor and I agreed that a joint investment needed to be made to reverse the deadly and troubling trend of heroin and opiate overdoses in Dane County,"" Parisi said in a statement.
In the weeks and months ahead, a number of work groups consisting of local officials, law enforcement, health care providers and alcohol and other drug abuse prevention community members will collaborate to tackle the issue.
""What we plan to do over these next few months is form groups to examine these issues and get people together to come up with strategies based on our best practices,"" Executive Director of Safe Committees Cheryl Wittke said.
Soglin said in order to get firm control of the problem, the city needs to start not with the illegal drugs but with prescription medication abuse, which can provide a gateway to heroin use and addiction.
The first two of the six goals of the initiative include reducing access to prescription drugs and hindering inappropriate prescription drug use.
Other initiatives include improving poisoning intervention to reduce overdose deaths and integrating mental health care to tackle the root causes of addiction.
In addition, the plan calls for early intervention, drug treatment and recovery efforts through family and community-assisted intervention efforts and detoxification and recovery programs.
""Family and friends are going to play a very critical role of how we solve this problem,"" Soglin said.
Substance abuse prevention through school-based programs, drug-free coalitions and other community partners is also included in the plan.
""This is not just a public health problem, and this is not just a problem with physicians or pharmacists,"" Soglin said. ""This is a problem that confronts all of us.""
