ArticleAmerican journal of public health2018
Modeling Health Benefits and Harms of Public Policy Responses to the US Opioid Epidemic.
Article in American journal of public health, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 118 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
118 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 236 citations in OpenAlex.
- Barriers and facilitators to initiating and adhering to harm reduction services among people who inject drugs in the United States: a systematic review.Harm reduction journal · 2026Pooled it
- A Systematic Review of Simulation Models to Track and Address the Opioid Crisis.Epidemiologic reviews · 2022Pooled it
- Economic Evaluation in Opioid Modeling: Systematic Review.Value in health : the journal of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research · 2021Pooled it
- Organizational perspectives on the impacts of scaling up overdose education and naloxone distribution in Kentucky.Addiction science & clinical practice · 2025Trial
- Reducing perceived barriers to scaling up overdose education and naloxone distribution and medications for opioid use disorder in the United States in the HEALing (Helping End Addiction Long-Term®) communities study.Preventive medicine · 2024Trial
- Evaluating demographic variation in no-cost naloxone distribution in North Carolina: a cross-sectional survey study.Harm reduction journal · 2026Article
- "Safer supply is the thing that changes everything": the role of prescribed safer supply in rebuilding trust following experiences of medical abandonment.BMC public health · 2026Article
- Burden of overdoses among persons with opioid use disorder in the United States, 2025-2028: a simulation modeling study.Lancet regional health. Americas · 2026Article
- OPOSim: An Agent-Based Model for Evaluating Long-Term Effects of Opioid Policy Outcomes in North Carolina.Journal of artificial societies and social simulation : JASSS · 2026Article
- From Peak to Plunge: A Multi-Database Analysis of State-Level Disparities in Hydromorphone Use in the US.Pharmacy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Creating a Classification System of Opioid Use Disorder Treatment Policies: A Research Protocol.Substance use & addiction journal · 2025Article
- What is necessary for implementation science to actually improve the state of addiction treatment and research?Journal of substance use and addiction treatment · 2025Article
- Naloxone Acceptance among Nightclub Attendees in New York City.Journal of community health · 2025Article
- Examining geographic disparities in access to no-cost naloxone in North Carolina: A cross-sectional survey of naloxone distribution programs.The Journal of rural health : official journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association · 2025Article
- Systemic barriers and stigma: Healthcare provider perspectives on perinatal and neonatal care in the fentanyl crisis.Journal of substance use and addiction treatment · 2025Article
- Passive exposure to opioid crisis information and public attitudes: Effects on local policy support, discrimination, and stigma in a United States national survey.Preventive medicine · 2025Article
- Community coalitions' navigation of policies to address the opioid epidemic: insights from qualitative interviews in four states.BMJ public health · 2025Article
- Article
- Prevalence and predictors of substance use as a factor in suicide in the USA, 2015-2020: a repeated cross-sectional analysis.BMJ public health · 2025Article
- Agent-Based Model of Combined Community- and Jail-Based Take-Home Naloxone Distribution.JAMA network open · 2024Article
58 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesTo estimate health outcomes of policies to mitigate the opioid epidemic.
methodsWe used dynamic compartmental modeling of US adults, in various pain, opioid use, and opioid addiction health states, to project addiction-related deaths, life years, and quality-adjusted life years from 2016 to 2025 for 11 policy responses to the opioid epidemic.
resultsOver 5 years, increasing naloxone availability, promoting needle exchange, expanding medication-assisted addiction treatment, and increasing psychosocial treatment increased life years and quality-adjusted life years and reduced deaths. Other policies reduced opioid prescription supply and related deaths but led some addicted prescription users to switch to heroin use, which increased heroin-related deaths. Over a longer horizon, some such policies may avert enough new addiction to outweigh the harms. No single policy is likely to substantially reduce deaths over 5 to 10 years.
conclusionsPolicies focused on services for addicted people improve population health without harming any groups. Policies that reduce the prescription opioid supply may increase heroin use and reduce quality of life in the short term, but in the long term could generate positive health benefits. A portfolio of interventions will be needed for eventual mitigation.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.