McLean County to host opioid summit

Posted on October 16, 2017

McLean County Sheriff Jon Sandage says he hopes an upcoming opioid summit will help police and prosecutors find ways to curtail the opioid crisis. (Photo courtesy Jon Sandage)

By Eric Stock

BLOOMINGTON – Police and prosecutors will be meeting in Normal next month to look for ways to combat the growing opioid epidemic in McLean County and across the United States.

McLean County Sheriff Jon Sandage told WJBC’s Scott Laughlin more money for law enforcement go after the distributors who sell the drugs illegally will help, but he says most of the funding must go toward treatment.

“We’d love to have the money for enforcement but they need to put the money toward treatment as well,” Sandage said. “There are not a lot of treatment beds available.”

Sandage said he’s working on a program with the State’s Attorney’s office to enable addicts to reach out to them to get the treatment they need.

“We are not immune from it and it doesn’t discriminate,” Sandage said. “It affects all classes of people, there’s just a lot of it out there and a lot of it people don’t see. That’s the scary thing.”

The closed-door summit will be held Nov. 14 at Illinois State University.

There were about 1,900 opioid deaths in Illinois last year.

Eric Stock can be reached at [email protected].

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