The Effect of Shutting Down Pioneering Drug Addiction Treatment Centers

Abstract

The number of confirmed cases of unintentional opioid overdose deaths has increased dramatically in recent years. There are several ways of treating addiction. Conventional medicine has a 5 to 20% sobriety rate after treating persons with substance use disorder for a year. An alternative model, known as the Massachusetts Model, developed by Dr. Punyamurtula Kishore of Preventive Medicine Associates, Inc. (PMAI), built upon the use of extended-release naltrexone claimed to have achieved a sobriety rate close to 60% at the one-year mark. The clinics were closed in 2011. In this paper, we use panel data collected at the county level from 2000 to 2014 to test whether there was an association between increased opioid overdose deaths and the shutdown of the PMAI clinics in Massachusetts. In our baseline model using dynamic panel data estimation, we find that while per capita opioid prescriptions increased opioid deaths per 100-thousand in the range of 10 to 15, PMAI clinics reduced the fatalities by 2 to 3. We also find that while measures of opioid prescriptions are not statistically significant in explaining heroin fatalities, PMAI clinics have a negative effect on those as well.