A state panel Thursday recommended issuing more than $44 million in grants for scores of addiction prevention and treatment efforts aimed at the deadly opioid overdose epidemic in Georgia. Dozens of nonprofit groups, universities and other organizations across the state submitted proposals to the Georgia Opioid Settlement Advisory Commission.
Over the next 18 years, about $479 million is expected to flow into Georgia to help fight opioid abuse. It will come from a $26 billion multistate court settlement reached with companies that made or distributed prescription painkillers linked to the opioid epidemic: AmerisourceBergen, now called Cencora; Cardinal Health; McKesson; and Janssen, now known as Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine. Applicants for the funding who don’t make the cut this year will have more opportunities to try again.
