State and local governments can anticipate more federal money to support their fights against the opioid epidemic. The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced nearly $2 billion in funding.

The funding will be distributed through grant programs administered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

From an HHS news release:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced more than $900 million in new funding for a three-year cooperative agreement with states, territories, and localities to advance the understanding of the opioid overdose epidemic and to scale-up prevention and response activities, releasing $301 million for the first year.

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This funding from CDC will help state and local governments track overdose data as closely to real-time as possible and support them in work to prevent overdoses and save lives. Funding for the first year is being awarded to 47 states, Washington, D.C., 16 localities, and two territories.

Local recipients of the first year CDC Overdose Data to Action Funding include Baltimore County ($2.6 million) and the Maryland Department of Public Health ($7.2 million).

The State Opioid Response grants from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration provide flexible funding to state governments to support prevention, treatment, and recovery services in the ways that meet the needs of their state…These grants have been awarded to all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and U.S. territories. In addition to the approximately $500M released earlier this year, SAMHSA released $932M in continuation funding to support the second year of the State Opioid Response program.

Maryland was awarded $33.1 million in year two of the SAMHSA SOR Grants for a total of $83.6 million over the course of the grant program

For more information read the full HHS news release.