Washington County signs onto new opioid settlement

WASHINGTON — Washington County has joined a fast-growing list of counties eligible for payouts from a legal settlement with Purdue Pharma and its owners, who manufactured and aggressively marketed the addictive painkiller OxyContin for decades, causing hundreds of thousands of overdose-related deaths.

All 50 states and District of Columbia signed onto the settlement June 18, for a combined payout as high as $7.4 billion. In a press release the same day, Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird said the Hawkeye State would be eligible for up to $37.8 Million over the next 15 years.

"OxyContin is an extremely harmful and addictive drug; lives have been lost and families forever changed because of its devastating effects,” she said in a statement. “Although a bittersweet victory, the nearly $38 million in settlement funds will continue Iowa’s fight against opioid addiction as we work to end the cycle of addiction and aid in recovery.”

It was not immediately clear what share of the money could go to rural areas, where the relatively low number of deaths is difficult to gauge. In over half the months from January of 2020 to December of 2024, Washington County’s number of overdose deaths was an unknown quantity between 1 and 9, with the CDC redacting the exact count due to confidentiality standards. For the same reason, it’s unclear how many overdose deaths in the county were linked to opioids, as opposed to other drugs.

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In every other month, the number of overdose deaths in Washington County was zero.

“This is just an agreement to say, ‘We have participated, and we agree to accept the money as the agreement specifies,’” Washington County Supervisor Jack Seward Jr. said. “If we don’t sign it, we don’t get it.”

Washington County has not yet declared any specific plans for the cash.

In conversations about another set of opioid-related settlement reached in 2021 and ‘22 — involving Allergan, CVS, Teva, Walgreens and Walmart — officials floated plans to spend the money on probation programs and drug screening supplies for the local hospital. Earlier this year, it spent some of the money on development of an app for the Washington County Sheriff’s Office.

The 2021 and ‘22 settlements qualified Iowa for $345 million, according to the Iowa Attorney General’s Office, also paid out over several years. Of that, Washington County was eligible for a total just above $506,000.

Other possible applications of the opioid money in Washington County, mentioned offhand over the last several years, have included data collection projects, paramedic training and ambulance supplies, and purchases of naloxone, a drug that can reverse opioid overdoses.

The board of supervisors voted 5-0 to sign onto the settlement agreement with Purdue Pharma Tuesday morning.

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com