Tag: Tennessee Department of Health

Categories
News News Blog News Feature

Shelby County, an HIV Hotspot, Forfeited $3M in Federal HIV Funding

Photo by Mathurin NAPOLY / matnapo on Unsplash

Shelby County continues to experience one of the highest HIV rates in the nation – designated one of 48 “hotspots” that are collectively responsible for half of all new U.S. infections.

Despite the urgent need for intervention, the Shelby County Health Department has had to forfeit more than $3 million of the $8.6 million in federal HIV prevention funding it has received in the past five years, according to information provided to lawmakers by the Tennessee Department of Health.

Credit: Tennessee Lookout

The funding came from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which – until last year – provided Tennessee with annual HIV prevention funding, distributed through the Tennessee Department of Health to local health departments and nonprofit organizations. Between 2019 and 2023, Shelby County’s share of the funding ranged from $816,000 to $1.7 million annually.

But in four of the past five fiscal years, Shelby County failed to tap all available CDC dollars. The money can be used to purchase HIV tests, hire public health workers to administer them and perform contact tracing to identify potentially additional cases. Last year, the county drew down just $410,000 of its $1.5 million grant.

In an August 23 letter to lawmakers highlighting the unspent funds, Tennessee Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Ralph Alvarado blamed CDC bureaucratic red tape and understaffing by the Shelby County Health Department.

Alvarado-LetterDownload

A spokesperson for the Shelby County Health Department, in turn, blamed delays in executing contracts with the state health department, a process that also requires approval by the Shelby County Board of Commissioners and acceptance by county contracting officials.

The spokesperson also cited the Covid pandemic’s lingering impact over the past four years, as reassigned sexual health workers limited the number of HIV investigations funded by the grants.

Dr. Ralph Alvarado, commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Health. (Photo: John Partipilo)

Losing out on $3 million in HIV funding in Shelby County has troubled advocates who work with limited budgets to educate, test, and provide resources to individuals impacted by HIV.

“Folks are making decisions between $3,000 medications and a roof over their heads,” said Cherisse Scott, CEO of Sister Reach, a Memphis reproductive health organization.

Sister Reach operates mobile vans that travel into underserved communities to offer testing and support. At $63 per HIV test, it’s a struggle to provide the service, she said. “The fact is those dollars have not trickled down” Scott said.

Rep. G.A. Hardaway, a Memphis Democrat, said Wednesday he planned to discuss the HIV expenditures with Shelby County health officials and local HIV advocates – and potentially the Tennessee Comptroller’s office, which is charged with investigating uses of public funding.

“Anytime we have federal dollars that cannot be spent in a timely fashion, we have to figure out why,” said Hardaway, who noted that local health officials may not have been in a position to responsibly spend money that came to them late in a grant cycle.

“We don’t want to get into a pattern where there’s too much red tape or we’re creating a situation where people are being rushed into spending in a way that would be ineffective,” he said.

Rising HIV rates

The letter from Dr. Alvarado outlining Shelby County HIV spending was sent in response to questions from Democratic lawmakers concerned that teens seeking HIV tests, along with other healthcare services, were being turned away from public health clinics if they did not have a parent’s permission.

Public health clinics began turning away unaccompanied teens on July 1st, shortly after Gov. Bill Lee signed a new state law requiring parental consent for healthcare services, the Lookout reported.

The state health department has since reversed course, instructing public health clinics to resume providing sexually transmitted disease testing and birth control to teens.

Rising rates of HIV in Shelby County sparked concern earlier this year when the Tennessee Department of Health and the Shelby County Health Department jointly issued a news alert. “Shelby County is experiencing a peak in a six-year trend of increasing HIV and syphilis infections,” Tennessee Department of Health Chief Medical Officer Dr. Tim Jones said in the new release. “Testing is critical in reducing these rates.”

The release noted a 36 percent increase in HIV rates in Shelby County since 2018 and a 40 percent increase among those 15- to 19-years old between 2018 and 2023.

The news has prompted renewed action among nonprofit advocates to stem the growing rates of HIV.

Conflicting disease data

But in his August 23rd letter to lawmakers, Dr. Alvarado said the number of newly diagnosed HIV infections have decreased in the past 14 months – a message at direct odds with previous public statements from his department.

Dr. Alvarado noted there had been a two-year backlog in investigating HIV cases at the Shelby County Health Department. Once the backlog was resolved, he noted, “there was not a significant, acute spike or ‘outbreak’ indicated, as reported by the press.”

Tennessee public clinics resume offering birth control, sexual disease tests to unaccompanied teens

The letter does not make clear how resolving the backlog in investigations resulted in fewer reported cases. Investigations, which include contact tracing to identify and test intimate partners, may result in more positive cases rather than fewer. The state health department did not respond to questions about the investigations.

Dr. Alvarado provided lawmakers with charts showing the number of HIV infections in Shelby County decreased from 358 in 2022 to 329 in 2023. Among teens in the county, the number of new infections increased from 22 to 37 during the same time period.

The data provided uses infection numbers, not rates of infections – a typical public health metric previously cited in health department press releases about HIV prevalence in Shelby County that measures the number of infections compared to population size.

The department did not respond to numerous requests seeking clarity on HIV infections in Shelby County.

Dr. Alvarado noted that the decrease in the number of HIV infections coincided with the rejection of federal HIV funding from the CDC by the Lee administration. Last year, Lee announced he would forgo all future CDC HIV prevention funding in a move widely seen as a politically-motivated effort to block the federal dollars from also going to Planned Parenthood clinics in Tennessee.

The state has since allocated its own funding for HIV prevention efforts. Shelby County this year received $1.7 million in state dollars and has thus far spent $885,000 on prevention efforts.

Tennessee Lookout is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: info@tennesseelookout.com. Follow Tennessee Lookout on Facebook and X.

Categories
News News Blog News Feature

New $34M Alliance Behavioral Health Crisis Center to Break Ground

Alliance Healthcare Services

Officials were slated to break ground on a $34-million crisis wellness center on Broad Avenue Friday. The 55,000 square-foot building  will expand the reach of Alliance Healthcare Services, the largest crisis services provider in the state. The Tennessee Department of Health is contributing $7 million to the new center.

The center will raise the number of Alliance’s beds from 27 to 45. Alliance will also add walk-in appointments for adults and be able to service children and families for the first time. 

Alliance works with police and fire departments across Shelby County to help divert those with mental illness from the criminal justice system and into proper treatment. Over a 12-month period, Alliance says its team helps save about $165 million in health care and jail costs.

The center is expected to open in December 2024.

Alliance CEO Laurie Powell gave us more details about the project. — Toby Sells  

Memphis Flyer: What services do you offer at Alliance Healthcare Services?

Laurie Powell: We’re the full continuum of behavioral health. We’re a [nonprofit] and we were incorporated in 1973. So, this is our 50th year.

We now have 19 locations, including our outpatient clinic, our housing for those with mental illness, our crisis operation, our emergency-room, and jail-diversion programs. We have over 450 employees right now and we’re growing. 

Tell me about the new crisis center. Where did the idea come from? Why is it needed?

We’ve been providing crisis services for adults 18 and over since 2008. That program has really grown. We have 120 employees for just that operation. Our crisis operation is on the second floor of the Memphis Mental Health Institute (MMHI). The state donated that space to us and now we need our own space, because we’ve outgrown it. We serve 13, 000 individuals in that program alone.

And growing, right?

Yes, from service and partnerships we’ve developed over the years. For example [Methodist Lebonheur Healthcare], [Baptist Memorial Health Care], and [Saint Francis Health System]. We respond to people who show up in their emergency rooms who are having a psychiatric crisis. We assess them, and we get them to the level of care they need. 

And also with the police and fire departments. I don’t know if you’ve heard about the co-response models to address psychiatric crises, but we have that with police and fire. We’re the mental-health provider for that.

How does this support the mission?

Our mission is to promote wellness in our community, right? That’s to lift up, promote. Everyone deserves quality behavioral health care without equity concerns. So, we don’t ask how much money can you pay us. We have grants to cover the uninsured that have mental health issues and sliding-scale fees. 

We’re using the term “no wrong door” for services. We’re really trying to remove barriers to accessing care immediately. At our outpatient clinics. … We’re going to walk-in appointments so people can be seen on the spot. 

Anything else new coming with the new building?

The new crisis assessment center, it’s open 24 hours, seven days a week. 

The facility we’re in now…can only serve adults. So, we’re going to add walk-in services for kids and families. We imagine there’s a lot of kids and families that need immediate access to care. So, they’ll be able to walk in voluntarily on the outpatient side. 

We never had an outpatient program at [our current location]. We didn’t have the space for it. We’ll be going from a 17,000-square-foot space to two floors with 55,000 square feet. We’ll really be able to expand what we’re doing.

The co-response process you mentioned with police and fire seems like it’s caught traction across the country. What does a typical episode like that look like?

The call comes into our crisis center. Somebody is wandering down Union Avenue, dancing, and naked in the street. Our care team gets out there to talk to and see if we can help that individual. The [emergency first responder] will be able to that medical screening evaluation. Then, you’ll have a Master’s-level therapist from Alliance do the [behavioral] assessment.

The police check for safety. It might be that the person has a weapon or a knife. Sometimes that happens. But I do want to emphasize that mentally ill individuals are more likely to be victims of violence than committing violence themselves. 

I know there’s been some really high-profile stories in the news where people that were untreated with schizophrenia, untreated with bipolar are not thinking clearly and commits acts of violence. It’s called anosognosia. That’s for individuals who are seriously mentally ill, who do not even know that they’re mentally ill.

All of this is also a good way to keep these people out of the criminal justice system, also, right?

Yes, and we were the first co-response model in the state. 

Like the example I gave you of the guy dancing down the street, the mom might be calling us and saying, “I can’t get him to come in anywhere.” That’s when the care team comes in. We can go out, help the family get him in to treatment, and reduce that revolving door. If he were taken to jail, it would be a different outcome. That’s the safety side.

The money side is that the costs savings are $165 million in diversion. That’s cost savings from jail and also diversion out of the emergency room, which can be very costly if you have the fire department taking someone to the emergency room who’s there for hours. 

The $165 million … Is that citywide, county-wide? 

That’s Alliance Health Care Services. It’s everyone that we diverted over a 12-month period plus the diversion cost of ambulance and the jail time. 

How many people have you diverted in a given time period? 

Last year’s data show 11,000 people were diverted from hospitalization, emergency rooms, and jails. That’s the best-kept secret of Alliance. We are the largest crisis provider in the state.

Anything I left out or anything you want to add?

We really want to make sure that people know our city deserves this; we deserve this state-of-the-art crisis center. There’s a reason why Memphis has more people in crisis and we could go into all those social determinants of health factors. But this [new building] is going to be in the hub of the city, 15 minutes away from anywhere. I’ve been thinking about this since I became the CEO in 2018. So, I’m just about to fall over. It’s finally happening. 

Categories
News News Blog News Feature

Xylazine-Related Drug Deaths on the Rise in Tennessee

Photo: Luchschen | Dreamstime.com
Shelby County Health Department

Overdose deaths involving an emerging drug called xylazine have climbed in Tennessee, according to the latest state data, and while a new law outlaws the drug here (for illicit purposes), officials are searching for ways to battle the drug. 

Xylazine is a non-opioid tranquilizer used by veterinarians, usually to sedate horses or cattle. Its street name is “tranq” or “tranq dope.” In legislation this year, the Tennessee General Assembly called xylazine the “Drug of the Living Dead.” That might be because that, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), those injecting the drug can develop severe wounds, including necrosis, the rotting of human tissue.

The powerful sedative is most often mixed with other drugs, especially fentanyl, but also with heroin and cocaine. A 2022 DEA report said the drug was first seen used as an adulterant in drugs from Puerto Rico but has become widespread. 

Xylazine is not listed as a controlled substance in the U.S., like cannabis or LSD, and is “readily available” to buy on the internet, the DEA said, in prices ranging from $6 to $20 per kilogram. 

“At this low price, its use as an adulterant may increase the profit for illicit drug traffickers, as its psychoactive effects allow them to reduce the amount of fentanyl or heroin used in a mixture,” reads the report. “It may also attract customers looking for a longer high since xylazine is described as having many of the same effects for users as opioids, but with a longer-lasting effect than fentanyl alone.”

Alarm bells began to ring on xylazine after the DEA report last year and newer reports that began to track the drug’s appearance in screens from overdose cases, especially fentanyl. More than half (66 percent) of the 107,735 drug poisonings from August 2021 to August 2022 were caused by fentanyl, according to the U.S. Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC). 

“Xylazine is making the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, fentanyl, even deadlier,” said DEA Admisntrator Anne Milgram. “DEA has seized xylazine and fentanyl mixtures in 48 of 50 States. The DEA Laboratory System is reporting that in 2022 approximately 23 percent of fentanyl powder and 7 percent of fentanyl pills seized by the DEA contained xylazine.”

In Tennessee, 56 drug overdose deaths involved xylazine in 2020, according to the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH). That number jumped to 94 in 2021, the state said. In all of these deaths, xylazine was found mixed with other drugs, mostly fentanyl, methamphetamine, Delta-9 THC, cocaine, and Xanax, TDH said. 

Tennessee Department of Health

The Shelby County Health Department does not break down suspected overdose deaths by drug type, an official said, so, it’s unknown how many drug deaths here involved opioids, fentanyl, or xylazine. However, as of July 22nd, 239 had died of suspected drug overdoses Shelby County. Forty-five percent of those were Black males and the most common age was 28. 

The latest state data show 549 drug overdose deaths in Shelby County in 2021, the highest of any Tennessee county that year. DEA data found xylazine rose in all four quadrants of the U.S. but saw the  highest rise (193 percent) in the South.

Earlier this year, state lawmakers added xylazine to the state’s Schedule III, placing it alongside steroids, ketamine, and some other depressants. This made possession of the drug a Class Class A misdemeanor, which could come with jail time of up to 11 months and 29 days and a $2,500 fine. 

In April, the Biden Adminstration used a brand new designation for fentanyl mixed with xylazine, labeling it “an emerging threat to the United States.” 

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

Vaccination Sensation

(Credit: Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash)

Once again, I’m scrapping a half-finished column for this space in favor of something more timely. The other piece was a little more hopeful, a little less serious. It’s evergreen, good beyond this news cycle, so I hope to get a chance to share it with you soon. I will if our state leaders will cool their jets for a week. (Smart bets say you’ll never see it.)

This morning, I read something in The Tennessean that seriously frightened me. On Monday, July 12th, (yesterday as of this writing), the Tennessee Department of Health fired Dr. Michelle Fiscus, the top vaccine official in the Tennessee state government. Fiscus claims she was fired to appease Republican state lawmakers who are angry about efforts to vaccinate teenagers. Maybe you remember the month-old consternation about state health officials “targeting” teens with ads on Facebook and social media? First of all, teens don’t spend too much time on Facebook these days, and, second, “targeting” youth with ads for a life-saving vaccine is a little like “attacking” people with a campaign encouraging them to eat their vegetables and drink eight glasses of water a day. 

Fiscus issued a statement, published by The Tennessean, that recounted the pushback she received for doing her job, for simply trying to protect Tennesseans. Though it deeply disturbs me to think that any of our elected officials would prize political party over the health and safety of their constituents, I would be lying if I said it surprised me. That’s been the play, hasn’t it? The messages have been “get back to work” and “don’t live in fear” and “come visit Tennessee,” totally ignoring that if every eligible Tennessean were vaccinated, we could all go back to work — and to restaurants and on vacation and wherever — with relative safety. 

Why have we wasted time and energy and money pursuing unconstitutional and discriminatory laws about who can use which bathroom? (A law that was in effect for just eight days before a federal judge issued an injunction — those are our tax dollars at work paying lawyers to defend a disgusting piece of legislation.) Why does our governor spend his time on trips to the southern border of the U.S., on promotional videos with Brad Paisley? Wouldn’t it promote travel to Tennessee if our vaccination rate was above 40 percent? Well, sure, but that’s not going to win anyone a spot on a GOP ticket. The game now is to out-Trump the competition, to vie for a sound bite on Fox News, the only currency that matters. 

I think these people are far beyond shame, and I want to use this space for something constructive. So I am again writing an earnest plea for all who can to get vaccinated against COVID-19. 

I say “all who can” because I recognize that some Memphians cannot be vaccinated. There are people with health conditions that preclude their ability to get the shot. And of course, there are children younger than 12 years old who can’t legally get the vaccine. Those kids will be back in school this fall. It’s for the sake of those who can’t that the rest of us must do so. 

And I’ll say right now, I’m fully vaccinated. It was quick, relatively painless, and absolutely free. I’m not asking anyone to do something I wouldn’t do myself. The side effects were mild. The day after each shot, my shoulder was a bit sore. The day after my second shot, I felt a little tired and muddle-headed. To be honest, I’ve had worse hangovers and far more uncomfortable bouts of the common cold. 

Why am I writing this now? Well, it seems we could use a boost. Hospitalizations and positive test rates are rising. The Flyer’s Toby Sells reports that the seven-day COVID-19 averages have more than doubled since last week. The reproductive rate of the virus is 1.22, the highest it’s been since June 2020. Meanwhile, The Tennessean’s vaccine tracker site reports that about 34.56 percent of Shelby County’s population is fully vaccinated, and the Delta variant is knocking on the door. 

Remember, every single person the virus infects is another chance for it to mutate, to become resistant to vaccines. To undo all the work we’ve done to claw our way back toward being able to see each other in public again. Because an incompletely vaccinated population presents multiple opportunities for this dreadful disease to become more contagious, more resistant to vaccinations and treatment measures, choosing to be vaccinated is in the public interest. It’s not just a personal choice. No, it’s the cost of living in this world with other people. 

Sometimes you have to do things to help protect your neighbors. It’s really that simple.

Jesse Davis
jesse@memphisflyer.com

Categories
News News Blog News Feature

Survey: About Half in State Willing to Get Vaccine

Photo by Alex Mecl on Unsplash

Just over half of Tennesseans polled about COVID-19 vaccines were ”willing but hesitant” to get the shot, according to new market research from state officials. 

The Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) hired a third-party research firm for a survey of more than 1,000 adult Tennesseans “exploring sentiments around the COVID-19 vaccine.” All 95 Tennessee counties were included in the survey, though 82 percent of the respondents were white, 15 percent were African American, and 3 percent were Latinx. 

Here are the key findings from the report:

• 53.7 percent of all respondents are willing but hesitant to receive a COVID-19 vaccine  

• The main reasons associated with vaccine hesitancy are safety and unknown long-term or short-term effects.

• Physicians and medical staff were considered the most trusted voice for Tennesseans seeking information for vaccines. 

“The results are consistent with national trends and show that Tennesseans want more information from trusted sources as they make their decision,” said TDH Commissioner Dr. Lisa Piercey. “This market survey was an important step in identifying where we can be helpful in providing information about safety and effectiveness.”

Categories
News News Blog

State Department of Health Pulls County Health Department Out of Vaccine-Distribution Loop

CREDIT: Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

In the wake of its most severe and prolonged weather emergency in recent history, Shelby County received another shock Tuesday with the announcement by the state Department of Health that the Shelby County Health Department has mismanaged storage, allocation, and distribution of COVID-19 vaccine. Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

Dr. Lisa Piercey, director of the TDH, said investigators from her department had, on an emergency weekend visit to Memphis, concluded that some 2,400 doses of temperature-sensitive Pfizer vaccine had been allowed to spoil before being distributed and were subsequently junked. The investigators had also determined that the Health Department was in possession of an inventory of some 50,000 doses — 30,000 more than the TDH had anticipated.

Those discoveries prompted a significant revision of how vaccines will be delivered henceforth to Shelby County, Piercey said. At least for the short run, they will not go to the Health Department for further allocation but will be delivered directly to the distribution sites of participating partners, which include the City of Memphis, UT Center for Health Sciences, and numerous other agencies, public and private, offering vaccination services.

Meanwhile, the TDH has dispatched personnel to embed with the Health Department as advisors. Piercey could offer no long-term prognosis on how long the new arrangement will last.

Dr. Shelley Fiscus of the TDH said that the spoiled Pfizer doses never left the premises of the in-house Health Department pharmacy that was the starting point of the local distribution network, but had been thawed along with doses that were distributed to vaccination sites. The surplus doses were refrigerated and then discarded after they had reached their expiration date.

This process occurred several times, beginning on February 3rd, and only on occasion could be blamed on the week of bad weather, the TDH investigation found. Poor “communication” was alleged to be a major cause of the spoliations.

Terming himself “absolutely supportive” of the state Department’s actions, Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris pronounced the discovered disruptions “gut-wrenching” and said he had terminated the county’s site manager who had managed the relationship with the pharmacy and had also requested for the pharmacist “to be removed.” He also said he had launched an internal investigation to complement the state review.

A public chorus of indignation on social media sites, which had previously focused on criticism of the Health Department’s restrictions and had increased with the snafus at the Pipkin vaccination site (now and henceforth to be managed by city government in connection with UT) began to focus on the new revelations. And members of the Shelby County Commission, many of whom had withheld public criticism earlier, were coming forward with expressions of concern.

“There’s no excuse for having to dump the vaccine,” said Commissioner Van Turner, although he said, in taking note of hits that the Health Department’s Alisa Haushalter was taking, that she “could have been better supported.” Commissioner Mick Wright, who has often slammed the Health Department for “insensitivity” in its dealing with small businesses and citizens, called for the County Commission to be directly involved in the deliberations of the city-county Covid-19 task force.

Categories
News News Blog

No Virus Data Monday As Results Swamp State System

COVID-19 Memphis
Infogram

No Virus Data Monday As Results Swamp State System

No new data on the COVID-19 outbreak in Shelby County will be issued Monday as the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) works through a Sunday shutdown of its data system caused by “an extremely high volume of both COVID-19 and other laboratory test results being reported.”

TDH announced the “unplanned shutdown” of the state’s data surveillance program Sunday. The daily case counts and other virus data will return “once the system returns to full functionality and complete and accurate data can be provided.”

The state uses the CDC’s National Electronic Disease Surveillance System Base System (NBS) to report data on illnesses. It’s also the system health department staffers use for public health case investigations.

“Due to an extremely high volume of both COVID-19 and other laboratory test results being reported, there have been recent intermittent backlogs of labs in queue to be imported into the NBS system,” reads the Sunday statement from the TDH. “This issue is not unique to Tennessee, and is affecting all NBS jurisdictions.”

The program shut down at 2 a.m. Sunday, and officials started entering lab results back to it by 11 a.m. Sunday.

For this, the statement reads, “A limited number of COVID-19 test results were imported into NBS in the last 24 hours. TDH will not release updated COVID-19 numbers (Sunday) since our data are incomplete. This will also affect our metropolitan health department partners and their data updates (Monday).

Here is the latest data on the virus here from Saturday:

Test results reported Saturday morning showed 100 new cases of COVID-19 in Shelby County, down from a near-record 365 new cases reported Friday. Though, the new, lower number may be a result of the lag in test result reporting mentioned by TDH.

The county’s overall average positive rate for COVID-19 rose slightly to 7.7 percent on all test results. The total number of COVID-19 cases here stands at 9,310. The death toll is now 181 in Shelby County.

Categories
News News Blog

Tennessee Health Department Reports First Death Related to Vaping

CREDIT: Cherie Moncada | Dreamstime.com

Cherie Moncada | Dreamstime.com

A Tennessean has died from a vape-related lung illness, the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) reported Thursday.

This is the first reported fatality related to the use of vaping or e-cigarettes in the state.

The patient suffered from a “serious respiratory disease,” according to the TDH, which did not provide any additional information about the deceased patient.

In a Thursday statement, Dr. Lisa Piercy, Tennessee Health Commissioner, offered condolences to the family and urged Tennneseans to avoid using vapes or e-cigarettes.

“We are extremely saddened by this loss of life and extend our sincere condolences to the patient’s family,” Piercy said. “We are working with partners across the country to investigate these cases of vaping-associated illnesses in Tennessee, and recommend Tenneseans consider refraining from using e-cigarettes or vaping while this investigation is underway.”

[pullquote-1]

To date there have been 53 reported cases of lung illnesses related to vaping in Tennessee, according to the TDH. Most of the patients are adolescents and young adults. There have been 1,299 cases across the country, leading to a total of 26 deaths, according to the latest numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The CDC, along with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration are investigating a cluster of pulmonary disease among people who use vapes or e-cigarettes.

Symptoms related to the illness include cough, shortness of breath, and chest pain. Other symptoms may include fever, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.

At this time officials have not linked a single product, substance, or chemical to all of the cases. However in many cases, patients have admitted to using a vape containing THC or tetrahydrocannabinol.

TDH is continuing to provide details about its ongoing investigation into these cases and the number of affected patients here. The numbers are updated every Thursday at 3:30 p.m.


Categories
News News Blog

Shelby County Fills Fewer Opioid Prescriptions, Sees More Overdose Deaths

CREDIT: DEA


DEA

The opioid fentanyl can be 100 times more potent than morphine.

Though the number of opioid prescriptions filled each year in Tennessee and Shelby County has been decreasing since 2013, the number of opioid overdose deaths have not. 

The latest available data from the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) shows that of the 1,776 drug overdose deaths that occurred in the state in 2017, 1,268 of them were opioid related.

Nationwide, 30 Americans die every day from opioid overdose, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

[pullquote-2]

Opioids include prescription opioids such as hydrocodone, oxycodone, morphine, and fentanyl, which can be 100 times more potent than morphine, as well as heroin and opium.

Shelby County saw a total of 207 drug overdose deaths in 2017. Of those, 159 were caused by an opioid. Nine more opioid-related deaths occurred that year than in 2016 and 66 more than in 2013. 


Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid often mixed with other illegal drugs and sold on the street, was by far the deadliest opioid in Shelby County in 2017. It led to 106 overdose deaths, while heroin led to 59 and opioid pain relievers led to 52.

Tennessee Department of Health

Fatal overdose data for Shelby County

Shelby County had the state’s third-highest number of opioid overdose deaths in 2017 behind Knox County, which had 196, and Davidson County, which had 184.

The TDH report also shows that in 2017, 66 percent of Tennesseans who died from an opioid overdose, filled a prescription included in the Tennessee Controlled Substance Monitoring Database within a year of their death.

Thirty-seven percent of Tennessee residents who died from an overdose that year filled a prescription for an opioid within two months of their death. This is a 20 percent decrease from the number who did so in 2013.

Just under 6.9 million opioid prescriptions were filled across the state in 2017. That’s a little over a million less than were filled in 2013. 

In Shelby County, which has a population of about 939,000 people, 607,512 opioid prescriptions were filled for pain in 2017. This number has steadily declined from 2013 when 718,103 opioid prescriptions were filled.

[pullquote-1]

D. Michael Dunavant, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee, said last week that many times those who end up addicted to heroin start with a dependence to prescription painkillers.

“Opioid misuse and abuse is an insidious epidemic, created in large part by the over-prescribing of potent opioids nationwide, and unfortunately, Tennessee and West Tennessee is at the center of that epidemic,” Dunavant said at a press conference last week as he detailed the indictment of sixteen medical professionals from Tennessee, including five from Memphis who allegedly illegally distributed of opioid prescriptions.

The five Memphis medical professionals — three doctors and two nurses — who were indicted along with 11 others from Jackson, Tennessee, were arrested in a sweep last week coordinated by U.S. Attorneys and the Department of Justice’s Appalachian Regional Prescription Opioid Strike Force (ARPO).

Together the medical professionals allegedly distributed more than 350,000 prescriptions for controlled substances, equaling about 32 million pills.