ANDERSON — The city of Anderson now has a treatment program for opiate addicts on which law enforcement and health care officials can agree.
The Vivitrol program was started in the Madison County Jail for pretrial inmates who are also opiate addicts. Vivitrol, the brand name of naltrexone, is a monthly injection that can aid in recovery for opiate addicts and alcoholics by reducing cravings.
Judge David Happe said the program is something that is needed to address the opiate problem in Madison County.
“If they can get their addiction under control, they are talented people who have held jobs and some are parents,” he said. “We just can’t afford to keep locking them up.”
Naltrexone is different than other medication-assisted treatments, such as methadone and suboxone, both of which are opiates. If someone takes an opiate, such as heroin, while on Vivitrol, that person won’t feel a high whatsoever.
“It’s not an opiate,” Happe said. “It’s something people aren’t going to be using recreationally. People aren’t going to try to steal it to abuse it.”
Incarcerated people who agree to participate in the Vivitrol program, including the injections and treatment, are released early.
The first injection is given to the inmate while he or she is still in jail by S&R Medical, shortly before release. Following release, the participant has to go to a health care center that offers the injections.
If participants stop seeking injections and treatment, they are turned back to the courts and often are reincarcerated.
Tony New, chief probation officer of adult probation, supervises those in the program. He said part of the reason the program started with only pretrial inmates is because he requires participants are drug- and alcohol-free for at least seven days before the first injection, which isn’t typically the case with addicts unless they are incarcerated.
“Sick people don’t make good recoveries,” New said.
The injections are costly, ranging from $750 to $1,000 per injection, New said. The first injection that is given in jail is provided as a free sample from Alkermes Pharmaceutical Manufacturing & Global Biopharmaceutical.
Since before the program started, various organizations have been going to the jail to sign inmates up for Medicaid or HIP 2.0 for health care once they are released. Both types of insurance cover Vivitrol.
For the gap between release and when insurance kicks in for those in the program, Recovery Works, a program through the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration, covers the cost, up to $2,500 per addict who have previously been incarcerated.
People in the program are intended to use naltrexone monthly for nine to 12 months, but they haven’t gotten that far yet, New said. The program began in February.
Twenty people have been enrolled in the program. New said he has screened around 70 to 80 people for it.
The screening process is important, New said. Some inmates have said they have opiate addictions when they don’t, in hopes of getting early release.
New said he doesn’t know how many people followed through with the injections after release, but Madison County Sheriff Scott Mellinger said he has seen some of those in the program return to jail.
Nonetheless, he said he is optimistic about the program, noting that Madison County has been listed among the worst in the state for heroin use and suicide.
“If this is successful, it will be a significant piece of us doing what we need for us to be doing,” he said.