US health secretary spends $1.8 billion to combat opioid crisis

More than $1.8 billion has been released by the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to help combat the opioid crisis in the USA.

HHS Secretary Alex Azar said the money would be used to help expand access to treatment and support closer monitoring of the drug overdose crisis.

As part of the new spending, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will use around $900 million to launch a three-year program to advance the understanding of the opioid overdose epidemic and to “scale-up prevention and response activities.”