Opioid impact forum set for June 17
A event designed to show the effects of the opioid crisis in Lee County will be held Tuesday, June 17.
The 'Stronger Together: Opioid Impact Forum' will be held from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. that day, according to a release from Lee County Community Support Services.
The event will take place at the Dennis A. Wicker Civic Center, located at 1801 Nash St. The topic will be Lee County's opioid crisis response.
It will include an update on the use of opioid settlement funds and remarks from community leaders.
Community organizations and government partners will have an opportunity to share information about resources and services.
In July 2021, then-Attorney General Josh Stein announced a $26 billion settlement with the nation's largest drug distributors. As a result, the Lee County Commissioners entered into a Memorandum of Agreement with the state to gain access to the opioid settlement funds.
Over an 18-year period, Lee County is expected to receive $7.8 million.
Since the initial disbursement of funds in 2022, Lee County has made progress in a variety of ways, including increasing naloxone distribution, entering contracts with eligible providers to help with treatment reimbursement and increasing transportation access, the release states.
Recent data indicated some improvement with the North Carolina's estimated overdose death rate decreasing by 28% from 2023 to 2024. However, there is still progress that needs to be made.
The opioid crisis continues to remain a pressing issue across the county, state and country. For Americans aged 18-44, the leading cause of death is fentanyl overdose. In 2024 alone, an estimated 3,025 North Carolinians and 87,000 people nationwide lost their lives from an overdose.
'Whether you have been directly impacted or simply want to be a part of the change, we welcome and value your presence at this event,' the release states.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Newsweek
9 minutes ago
- Newsweek
Donald Trump's Net Approval Positive on Only One Key Issue
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. President Donald Trump's net approval rating is negative on a range of issues except immigration, a new poll shows. According to political analyst and statistician Nate Silver, writing in his Silver Bulletin Substack, Trump has a net negative approval rating on trade, the economy and inflation but a slightly positive rating on immigration. Why It Matters Taking the temperature of the nation, approval ratings are good measures of the public's response to Trump's policies and his actions as president. In the first few months of his second term, Trump's popularity has fluctuated, with some polls more favorable than others. Sustained backlash to his policies could persuade the president to change his approach. Trump, who made immigration a central part of his campaign, has vowed to crack down on border security, carry out mass deportations and end federal benefits for people residing in the country illegally. President Donald Trump speaking with reporters in the rain after arriving on Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on May 30. President Donald Trump speaking with reporters in the rain after arriving on Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on May 30. AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson What To Know Silver aggregated dozens of recent polls and found that Trump's approval rating on immigration was +2.5 percent. The president did not fare as well on other issues, with a -9.5 percent approval rating on trade, -11.3 percent on the economy and -17.5 percent on inflation. May polling conducted by Verasight U.S. for Strength in Numbers found similar results, with Americans disapproving of the president's handling of all the policy areas they were asked about except border security. That poll also found that 49 percent disapproved of his immigration policy, while 47 percent approved. Overall, Silver found that when analyzing the polls, Trump had a -5.4 net approval rating. An RMG Research/Napolitan News poll, conducted between May 14 and 21 among 3,000 registered voters, showed Trump's approval rating at 48 percent, with 50 percent disapproving. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 1.8 percentage points. Other polls have found a more positive response to the president. According to a recent Rasmussen survey, 53 percent of respondents said they approved of Trump, while 46 percent said they disapproved. What People Are Saying Scott Lucas, a professor in international politics at University College Dublin, previously cautioned against reading too much into any one poll, telling Newsweek: "Opinion polls have their own biases." President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social on April 20: "We are, together, going to make America bigger, better, stronger, wealthier, healthier, and more religious, than it has ever been before!!!" What Happens Next The midterm elections, scheduled for November 2026, may offer a clearer indication of voters' attitudes toward the president's policies.
Politico
16 minutes ago
- Politico
The ‘Medicaid moderates' are the senators to watch on the megabill
The Senate's deficit hawks might be raising the loudest hue and cry over the GOP's 'big, beautiful bill.' But another group of Republicans is poised to have a bigger impact on the final legislative product. Call them the 'Medicaid moderates.' They're actually an ideologically diverse bunch — ranging from conservative Josh Hawley of Missouri to centrist Susan Collins of Maine. Yet they have found rare alignment over concerns about what the House-passed version of the GOP domestic-policy megabill does to the national safety-net health program, and they have the leverage to force significant changes in the Senate. 'I would hope that we would elect not to do anything that would endanger Medicaid benefits as a conference,' Hawley said in an interview. 'I've made that clear to my leadership. I think others share that perspective.' Besides Hawley and Collins, other GOP senators including Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Jerry Moran of Kansas and Jim Justice of West Virginia have also drawn public red lines over health care — and they have some rhetorical backing from President Donald Trump, who has urged congressional Republicans to spare the program as much as possible. Based on early estimates from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, 10.3 million people would lose coverage under Medicaid if the House-passed bill were to become law — many, if not most, in red states. That could spell trouble for Majority Leader John Thune's whip count: He can only lose three GOP senators on the expected party-line vote and still have Vice President JD Vance break a tie. Republicans already have one all-but-guaranteed opponent in Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky so long as they stick to their plan to raise the debt limit as part of the bill. They also view Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson as increasingly likely to oppose the package after spending weeks blasting the bill on fiscal grounds. Meeting either senator's demands could be enormously difficult given the tight fiscal parameters through which House leaders have to squeeze the bill to advance it in their own chamber. That in turn is empowering the senators elsewhere in the GOP conference to make changes — and the Medicaid group is emerging as the key bloc to watch because of its size and its overlapping, relatively workable demands. Heeding those asks won't be easy. Republicans are counting on savings from Medicaid changes to offset hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts, and rolling that back is likely to create political pain elsewhere for Thune & Co., who already want to cut more than the House to assuage a sizable group of spending hawks. At the same time, Speaker Mike Johnson is insisting the Senate make only minor changes to the bill so as to maintain the delicate balance in his own narrowly divided chamber. Thune and Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) have already acknowledged that Medicaid, covering nearly 80 million low-income Americans, will be one of the biggest sticking points as they embark this month on a rewrite of the megabill. They are talking with key members in anticipation of difficult negotiations and being careful not to draw red lines publicly. 'We want to do things that are meaningful in terms of reforming programs, strengthening programs, without affecting beneficiaries,' Thune said, echoing language used by some of the concerned senators. Crapo voiced support in an interview for one pillar of the House bill — broad new work requirements for Medicaid beneficiaries — but rushed to add that he's 'still working with a 53-member caucus to get answers' to how the program can be overhauled: 'I can only speak for myself.' Complicating their task is the fact that some in the group — namely Collins and Murkowski — have a proven history of bucking their party even amid intense public pressure. The pair, in fact, helped tank the GOP's last party-line effort on health care, in 2017. Leaders view them as unlikely to be moved by the type of arm-twisting Republicans are planning to deploy to bring enough of the fiscal hawks on board. And then there's Hawley, who is playing up Trump's own warnings to congressional Republicans about keeping their hands off Medicaid. Hawley and Trump spoke shortly before the House passed its bill, with the senator recounting that the president said 'absolutely categorically, 'Do not touch Medicaid. No Medicaid benefit cuts, none.'' Hawley, like Crapo, has indicated he is comfortable with work requirements, but he is pushing for two major tweaks to the House language: undoing a freeze on provider taxes, which most states use to help finance their share of Medicaid costs, and new co-payment requirements for some beneficiaries that he has been calling a 'sick tax.' The provider tax changes would present an issue with multiple senators, who fear it would exacerbate the bill's impact on state budgets and slash funding that helps keep rural hospitals afloat. Justice, a former governor, called it a 'real issue.' 'They haven't done anything to really cut into the bone except that one thing,' Justice added. 'That's gonna put a big burden on the states.' Moran grabbed the attention of his colleagues when he warned in a pointed April floor speech that making changes to Medicaid would hurt rural hospitals. A 'significant portion' of his focus, he said, 'is to make sure the hospitals have the capability and the revenues necessary to provide the services the community needs — Medicaid is a component of that.' Collins, who is up for reelection in 2026, has also left the door open to supporting work requirements, depending on how they are crafted. She has also raised concerns about the provider tax provision, noting that 'rural hospitals in my state and across the country are really teetering.' Murkowski, meanwhile, isn't as concerned about the provider tax, because Alaska is the only state that doesn't use it to help cover its share of Medicaid spending. But she has expressed alarm over the House's approach to work requirements, including a decision to speed up the implementation deadline to appease House hard-liners. She said it would be 'very challenging if not impossible' for her state to implement. As it is, any effort to water down the House's Medicaid language will face steep resistance in other corners of the GOP-controlled Senate, where lawmakers are pushing to amp up spending cuts, not scale them back. Some senators, in fact, want to further tighten the House's work requirements or reduce, not just freeze, the provider tax. 'I'd be damned disappointed if a Republican majority with a Republican president didn't make some reforms,' said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). 'The provider tax is a money laundering machine. … If we don't go after that, we're not doing our jobs.' Ron Johnson and a few others are continuing to push to change the cost split for those Medicaid beneficiaries made eligible under the Affordable Care Act. The federal government now picks up 90 percent of the cost, and House centrists nixed an effort by conservatives to reduce it. One idea under discussion by conservatives is to phase in the change to appease skittish colleagues and state governments, but that is still likely to be a nonstarter for 50 GOP senators. Hawley warned that 'there will be no Senate bill if that is on the table.' Adam Cancryn contributed to this report.
Yahoo
25 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Nebraskans have a couple of questions
Nebraska's congressional delegation is shown in Washington. From left: U.S. Rep. Mike Flood, R-Neb., Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen, U.S. Sen. Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., U.S. Rep. Adrian Smith, R-Neb., U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., and U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb. Feb. 5, 2025. (Courtesy of Nebraska Governor's Office) Welcome to another 'What If?' press conference, questions for Nebraska's congressional delegation in Washington. Since our last session, the White House has tried to shutter the U.S. Department of Education, our tariff 'policy' resembles a yo-yo, the inaptly-named 'big, beautiful bill' has uglied up the nation's balance sheet, and curious Americans have taken to looking up both 'emoluments' and 'original sin.' Let's start with the aforementioned BBB. The House kept vampire hours to pass it by a single vote, after which the yays, apparently in a fit of sleep-deprived hubris, congratulated themselves before the bill went to the Senate. We have a couple questions: Your own accounting firm, the Congressional Budget Office, determined the BBB gives 60% of its tax breaks to the top fifth of the income bracket, yet cuts food assistance and health care to millions of poorer Americans. How does this benefit the country and what problem does it solve? The five of you belong to a political party that has historically railed against deficits. The CBO projects the BBB will add $3.8 trillion to the nation's deficit over the next decade. Please explain what the economic advantage is here, given the dismal history of such cuts: See Reagan 1981, G.W. Bush 2001 and 2003 and Trump 2017 for details. We'll move on. During a recent congressional hearing the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security couldn't come up with the meaning of habeas corpus when she was asked to define it. This comes on the heels of recent interviews in which high-ranking administration officials, including the president, couldn't guarantee that federal detainees would be given due process. Hmm? Assuming you still support habeas corpus and due process, when and how should Congress intervene when the administration ignores these most basic of principles in a country in which the rule of law is paramount? This next question is actually a matter of math. According to the Partnership for Public Service, using numbers from the federal Office of Personnel Management, 'in absolute numbers, the federal workforce is slightly smaller than it was 50 years ago, even as the U.S. population has increased by nearly two-thirds during that time period.' Even though the courts have tied up or reversed much of the Department of Government Efficiency's work, how do you square those numbers with DOGE's scorched-earth policy, especially since the American public has been provided scant evidence of findings of waste, fraud, and abuse, the triplex premise on which DOGE hangs its hat? Time to talk tariffs. To date, even a casual observer would conclude that the president's on again, off again tariff proclamations have roiled markets and created uncertainty with little resulting economic benefit. As you know, Article I, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution gives only Congress the power to levy tariffs. Even though previously enacted laws allow Congress to let the president set tariffs in certain situations, could you explain and defend the 'qualifying' situation in which we find ourselves and detail how Congress sitting on the sidelines at this juncture in the levying of tariffs benefits Americans? The president has pulled $2.5 billion from Harvard University, threatened its tax-exempt status, tried to block enrollment of foreign students and pretty much wants a say in whom it should hire and what it should teach. All this to curb what he says is Harvard's anti-semitism, a charge which, while acknowledged in part by the school, remains without specifics. (Nevermind that the president hosted a cryptocurrency dinner during which a number of coins carried virulently anti-semitic names.) Some have argued that Harvard is simply the poster child for the administration's 'war on higher education,' in the guise of eliminating DEI, CRT, essentially any voice contrary to its liking. First, should the government be telling colleges and universities what to teach, who should teach it and who is allowed to learn? Please respond to the following quote as it relates to social studies and history curricula. 'History is not there for you to like or dislike. It is there for you to learn from. And if it offends you, even better, because you are less likely to repeat it. History is not yours to change or destroy. It belongs to all of us.' Could you explain what problem is solved by closing the Department of Education, which, as you know, sets no curriculum? Finally, does it ever occur to you that some in Washington have no idea what they are doing or worse, know what they are doing, know it's bad for America and do it anyway? Asking for some friends. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
