As part of a massive opioid lawsuit settlement, Bucks County will receive nearly $45 million over the next 18 years.
As part of an agreement with input from local and county governments and negotiated by the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office and other governments across the country, the opioid settlement agreement with the nation’s three major pharmaceutical distributors – Cardinal, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen – and Johnson & Johnson was reached earlier this year.
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Statewide, $1.07 billion is set to come to governments to help cover the impact of the opioid epidemic over the years.
All 67 Pennsylvania counties, including 241 local governments with a population of 10,000 or more, joined the historic $26 billion nationwide opioid agreement.
“In one way or another, every municipality in the nation was involved in that litigation,” Bucks County Solicitor Joe Khan said.
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As part of the settlement, all Bucks County municipalities, county government, and the district attorney’s office all agreed to end their lawsuits against the companies.
The county’s solicitor noted that even if one municipality in the county held out, Bucks County would have received $9 million less.
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Khan told the Bucks County Commissioners earlier this year that a lot of work at different levels of government made the settlement happen.
“While no dollar amount will bring back what we have lost, this settlement was negotiated to allocate funding to states and local communities who have been most impacted by this crisis, and will provide more resources for treatment than any previous settlement,” Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said in a statement when the settlement was agreed to.
As the county is receiving the first funds from the settlement, the Bucks County Commissioners have created the Opioid Advisory Committee to determine how the money will be used.
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The funds can be used to address treatment for opioid addiction, recovery from addiction, prevention, training, research, and for emergency responders.
Bucks Countians are able to take part in the planning process by emailing their feedback to oac@buckscounty.org by July 7 or by taking part in community forums. The in-person and virtual community forum will take place Thursday from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. in Room 110A at the Administration Building in Doylestown Borough, while the second will take place virtually Thursday from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
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In March, the commissioners agreed to a separate opioid-related lawsuit settlement with Collegium Pharmaceutical, which involved 27 governments. The agreement will bring the county $400,000 to $450,000 that will be used to fund the co-responder program that pairs social workers with police.
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