Between 2015 and 2017, individuals who identify as Black and Latino in the United States faced the highest rates of increase in opioid-involved deaths. In a new publication, Erick Guerrero, Hortensia Amaro, Tenie Khachikian, Mona Zahir, and Jeanne Marsh (CHAS Director and George Herbert Jones Distinguished Service Professor at the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice) highlight this disproportionate increase and the significant ethnoracial and socioeconomic inequities in accessing evidence-based treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD). The article highlights that Black and Latino clients are less likely to complete OUD treatment than white clients. Although medication OUD treatment (MOUD) benefits clients of all backgrounds, Black and Latino clients face 30% lower odds of receiving MOUD. The authors state that “recognizing how the current structure of addiction health services system may perpetuate bifurcated and racialized OUD treatment is as critical as developing and deploying anti-racist federal, state, and county policies and practices to ensure equity in access to high-quality care in OUD treatment.” Read all of the authors’ policy and practice recommendations in the article below. |