Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Drugmaker Mallinckrodt May Be Considering Exiting Opioid Business
The Wall Street Journal: Bankrupt Drugmaker Mallinckrodt Considers Sale Of Opioid Business
Pharmaceutical manufacturer Mallinckrodt, one of America’s largest producers of prescription opioids, is in talks with its major investors about selling some or all of the company’s business units, potentially leading to its exit from the opioid business, according to people familiar with the discussions. (Saeedy, 9/18)
More on the opioid crisis —
San Francisco Chronicle: San Francisco Drug Overdose Death Numbers Are Rising Again
The numbers underscore how San Francisco officials continue to struggle to address the devastation of fentanyl on the city’s streets — a crisis that Health Director Dr. Grant Colfax called “distressing.” The last figures indicate people are dying from fentanyl overdoses at a rate of nearly three people a day. Colfax and and other health leaders on Monday announced a renewed push to urge people struggling with addiction to seek treatment. (Ho and Leonard, 9/18)
The New York Times: Fentanyl Found Near Nap Mats At Day Care Where Boy Died, Police Say
A kilogram of fentanyl was found near mats that children used for napping at a Bronx day care site where one toddler died and three other children were hospitalized last week, the police said on Monday night. Chief Joseph Kenny, the Police Department’s chief of detectives, explained just how close to the children the potent narcotic was: “It was laid underneath a mat where the children had been sleeping earlier,” he said at a news conference, where he joined Mayor Eric Adams and other city officials. (Kilgannon and Shanahan, 9/18)
The Washington Post: Sober Homes Promised Help And Shelter. Some Delivered Fraud, Officials Say.
In August, the New Mexico attorney general unveiled a campaign warning unsheltered people from “being lured” into traveling across state lines “to illegitimate recovery facilities.” The Blackfeet Nation in Montana in July declared a state of emergency aimed at helping displaced members, while one of the state’s senators, Jon Tester (D), demanded an investigation from the federal agency that oversees Medicaid services. (Ovalle, 9/18)
The Washington Post: How One Company Profited While Delaying Narcan’s Drugstore Debut
Five years after public health officials first asked for it, Narcan finally hit store shelves this month — a potentially pivotal moment in the fight to counter the country’s stubbornly high death toll from heroin, fentanyl and pain pills. Now, anyone can buy the opioid overdose reversal drug without a prescription. But it almost didn’t happen. Narcan’s maker, Emergent BioSolutions, for years refused to allow its blockbuster drug to be sold over the counter (known as OTC), frustrating health experts and workers on the epidemic’s front lines who saw making Narcan and other naloxone-based medicines easier to buy as a way to save lives. (Frankel, 9/18)
