{"id":44133,"date":"2021-10-20T22:01:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-21T04:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-opts-in-to-statewide-opioid-settlement\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:17:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:17:49","slug":"durango-opts-in-to-statewide-opioid-settlement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-opts-in-to-statewide-opioid-settlement\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango opts in to statewide opioid settlement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Mercy
Mercy Regional Medical Center\u2019s emergency department staff is cutting back on the opioid medication it gives to manage pain. OxyContin and hydrocodone are common opioid painkillers.<\/span>Toby Talbot\/Associated Press file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The Durango City Council decided Tuesday to participate in a $400 million statewide settlement against the \u201cbig 3\u201d pharmaceutical distributors and a drugmaker for their involvement in the opioid epidemic.<\/p>\n

After years of litigation, the state of Colorado reached a settlement with the three largest pharmaceutical distributors, AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson, and drugmaker Johnson & Johnson.<\/p>\n

Colorado will receive payments on the $400 million settlement over the next 18 years. Twenty percent of the $400 million will be dispersed among local governments that opt in to the settlement. Sixty percent will be allocated among 19 regions in the state, including La Plata, Montezuma, Archuleta, Dolores and San Juan counties, which comprise Region 17. Ten percent will go toward infrastructure, and the final 10%, to the state.<\/p>\n

Native American reservations will receive a 10% share of state funding, according to Colorado Attorney General Phil Wieser.<\/p>\n

The drug distributors and drugmaker agreed to pay a total of $26 billion as part of the overall, nationwide settlement.<\/p>\n

Durango Police Chief Bob Brammer told council that opting in to the settlement would net the Southwest region about $3.4 million. The city of Durango can expect to receive around $190,000 of that $3.4 million.<\/p>\n

Settlement money must be used for approved purposes, such as treatment, harm reduction, training health care providers and mobile services for treatment along with other abatement strategies.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that arresting our way out of this isn\u2019t going to occur,\u201d Brammer said. \u201cWhat we\u2019re looking at is more of a treatment option, and that\u2019s going to have to be a combined effort with multiple entities in our area.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mayor Kim Baxter asked the police chief if the funds could be bonded upfront, so that action against the opioid epidemic won\u2019t be parsed out over 18 years, but Brammer did not have an answer. City Attorney Dirk Nelson said he believes an upfront bond would be possible, but it would require a vote of the people.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeems like we could get something done right now instead of waiting,\u201d Baxter said.<\/p>\n

njohnson@durangoherald.com<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

$400 million will be given to Colorado from \u2018big 3\u2019 distributors, drugmaker <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44134,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,3131,668],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-44133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-prescription-drugs","tag-public-health"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44133"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44133\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85984,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44133\/revisions\/85984"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44133"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=44133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}