EDC to Lead SAMHSA’s New National Substance Misuse Prevention Center
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has awarded EDC the Strategic Prevention Technical Assistance Center (SPTAC), a five-year $32 million contract to prevent substance misuse in the United States.
Through EDC’s leadership, SPTAC experts will provide evidence-based training and technical assistance to SAMHSA’s prevention grantees across the country, improving their workforce knowledge and skills to successfully implement SAMHSA’s Strategic Prevention Framework. The Center will have a special focus on supporting state, local, and tribal work groups in identifying and prioritizing prevention efforts for people who experience behavioral health inequities due to income, race, gender, disability, language, or other factors.
Substance misuse remains a leading cause of preventable death in the United States, costing over $500 billion each year. The 2020 National Survey on Drug Use and Health states that 40.3 million people aged 12 and older had a substance use disorder in the past year. During that same time span, 21.4 percent of people aged 12 or older used illicit drugs.
“SPTAC will be the nation’s foremost vehicle for addressing states’ and communities’ most pressing substance misuse and behavioral health needs,” said Chelsey Goddard, EDC vice president and SPTAC project director. “The COVID-19 pandemic and related stressors have contributed to increased substance misuse and mental disorders. Through SPTAC, we will build the capacity of SAMHSA’s prevention grantees to create and sustain healthy communities.”
SPTAC continues EDC’s decades of partnering with SAMHSA to address substance misuse. This partnership includes EDC’s eight years of leading SAMHSA’s Center for the Application of Prevention Technologies (CAPT), which supported tens of thousands of substance misuse prevention and behavioral health providers in the United States.
EDC’s five regional teams will work across the 10 Health and Human Services regions to assist SAMHSA grantees to:
- Assess the substance misuse prevention needs of populations, with a focus on underage alcohol and cannabis use and prescription drug misuse
- Prepare prevention systems to address the needs of people who face disparities in accessing culturally and linguistically responsive and effective substance misuse services
- Develop strategic plans that link identified prevention risk factors to clear and measurable outcomes
- Implement evidence-informed programs, practices, and policies, including universal, selective, and indicated prevention strategies
- Evaluate the effectiveness of prevention efforts implemented
EDC’s partners on SPTAC include Carnevale Associates, LLC; HeadSpin Software; Synergy Enterprises; University of Oklahoma—Southwest Prevention Center; and University of Nevada-Reno, Center for the Application of Substance Abuse Technologies.
Explore all of EDC’s work focused on opioid and other substance misuse prevention and behavioral, physical, and mental health.