Rep. Conroy, Advocates Push DuPage, Other Jails on Treatment Meds

(Springfield, IL) – One of Illinois’ top behavioral health advocacy groups and a key House Democratic lawmaker are rolling out an official push to have the state’s county jails adopt a universal policy of providing medication-assisted treatment to incarcerated individuals with substance use disorders.

At the initiative of the Illinois Association for Behavioral Health, State Rep. Deb Conroy (D-Villa Park) on Friday, February 26, filed House Resolution 131 that supports “mandating a statewide standard that requires all Illinois counties to provide Medication-Assisted Treatment medications to individuals under their jurisdiction requiring such services.”

Conroy’s measure comes on the heels of a lawsuit filed against the DuPage County Sheriff’s office by the ACLU of Illinois over its policy of not providing anti-opioid addiction treatment medications to inmates. The ACLU suit is on behalf of Christine Finnigan who has a doctor’s prescription for methadone and who just began to serve a 30-day sentence in the DuPage jail over a 2016 incident.

Conroy’s resolution explicitly cites the DuPage County lawsuit.

“The medical science is clear on the value of methadone for individuals with substance use orders, so the sheriff’s refusal to recognize a doctor’s prescription is inexplicable,” said Illinois Association for Behavioral Health CEO Jud DeLoss. “Rep. Conroy earns our applause for her courage and leadership to call for a 102-county, standardized, medical science-based policy for permitting medication assisted treatment in Illinois’ county jails.”

Conroy, chairperson of the House Mental Health and Addiction Committee, says that medication-assisted treatment is part of broader behavioral health approach and has proven effective in jails elsewhere.

“Medication-assisted treatment is used effectively in coordination with counseling to provide a ‘whole-patient’ approach to the treatment of substance use disorders,” said Conroy. “The Rikers Island Jail in New York, for example, has provided medication-assisted treatment medications to inmates and has witnessed few overdose deaths after inmates are released, so I think Illinois would be well-served by a statewide standard of a criminal justice treatment model that works.”

davidormsby@davidormsby.com