The companies judged to have created and perpetuated the opioid crisis in the country have been forced via lawsuits to provide money to state and local governments to battle the addiction problem – and now there’s a new tranche of money coming to local governments in North Carolina.

Guilford County government is already on track to get about $22 million from a previous national lawsuit against the opioid manufacturers and distributors and now the county and others around the state will get even more.

According to a report from the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners, counties across the state will be eligible to receive funds from recently announced opioid litigation settlements with the following companies: CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, Allergan and Teva.

The NC Department of Justice announced the five new national opioid settlements with the new funds totaling an additional $600 million for North Carolina and the local governments in the state.

This money is in addition to the first round of settlements that came to about $750 million, which local governments and the State of North Carolina have begun receiving.

In the first round of funding from the lawsuit over the misdeeds of the opioid companies that led to a nationwide addiction problem, 85 percent of the funds went to local governments with the rest going to the state.

The distribution formula for the new funds will be similar to the original North Carolina Memorandum of Agreement allocation that was signed two years ago.

In order to receive the money from the new settlement, counties in the state are required to do the following:

  • The county’s Board of Commissioners must approve a resolution joining the settlements.
  • County staff needs to sign on to all five settlements as well as to a “Supplemental Agreement for Additional Funds.”

 

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