Rate of Black Men in Prison Has Dropped by Nearly Half, New Opioid Overdose Reversal Drug, More... (10/13/23)

Ohio's Republican Senate leader is threatening to mess with a marijuana legalization initiative if it passes, the Israel-Hamas war has caused a pause in Germany's march toward marijuana legalization, and more.

A new opioid overdose reversal drug, OpVee, has hit the market.

Ohio GOP Senate President Vows to Mess with Marijuana Legalization Initiative If It Passes. The GOP-dominated state Senate has already passed a resolution opposing the Issue 2 marijuana legalization initiative (as well as the Issue 1 abortion rights amendment), and the Republican Senate leader now says that while the legislature would not try to repeal the initiative if it passes, it is likely to try to modify it.

In the Senate, Senate President Matt Huffman (R-Lima) said that passage of the initiative would cause a "mental health crisis," adding that "this initiated statute is coming right back before this body."

When pressed after the session about precisely what he meant, Huffman clarified. "I will advocate for reviewing it and repealing things or changing things that are in it," he said.

He said he was perturbed about a social equity provision that allocates some marijuana tax revenues for programs aiding people with marijuana convictions to get licenses and financial assistance.

Harm Reduction

New Opioid Overdose Reversal Drug Opvee Comes to Market. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a new opioid overdose reversal drug, Opvee, back in June, and now, the manufacturer, Indivior, has begun shipping the drug to pharmacies and first responders.

Opvee is a nasal spray containing the opioid receptor-blocking drug nalmefene. It is approved for use in people 12 and over and requires a prescription.

While the market for overdose reversal drugs is growing crowded, with Narcan already widely available and now available without a prescription at major drug store chains a second naloxone nasal spray, RiVive from Harm Reduction Therapeutics aimed at community groups coming soon, Opvee aims to position itself as being better able to respond to fentanyl overdoses. The company says it is a better match against fentanyl because its formulation is more powerful than Narcan or other forms of naloxone.

Former Surgeon General Jerome Adams called Opvee a "fentanyl fighter" and another tool for public health officials to counter illicit fentanyl driving the nation's overdose deaths. "It's as if it was designed to combat fentanyl," Adams said. "It matches up well with the potency and the longevity of fentanyl, so it's a new valuable tool that is available."

But as with other opioid overdose reversal drugs, cost is an issue. Opvee will go for $75 per kit for public interest and government purchasers and $98 for others with no insurance. Narcan now goes for $44.99 for a two-dose kit, while RiVive will go for $36.

Sentencing

Rate of Imprisonment for Black Men Has Dropped by Nearly Half Since 2000, Report Finds. The Sentencing Project released a new report, "One in Five: Ending Racial Inequity in Incarceration," that presents an overview of trends in incarceration and community supervision. The report identifies the progress made in the 21st century in reducing the US prison population and its racial and ethnic disparities, while sounding the alarm about the future of reforms. One in five Black men born in 2001 is likely to experience imprisonment within their lifetime, a decline from one in three for those born in 1981. But rather than accelerate the pace of reforms, pushback from policymakers threatens further advancement.

According to the report, the imprisonment rate of Black men in 2021 declined substantially, falling by almost half (48%) since 2000, yet Black men were still imprisoned at 5.5 times the rate of white men. The imprisonment rate of Black women declined even more, by 70% since 2000, but Black women remained imprisoned at 1.6 times the rate of white women.

The report also found that the total prison population has declined by 25% after reaching its peak level in 2009; while all major racial and ethnic groups experienced decarceration, the Black prison population has downsized the most; and American Indian and Latinx people were imprisoned at 4.2 times and 2.4 times the rate of whites in 2021, respectively.

The momentum for continued progress is precarious. We've seen a backlash to the progress we've made on criminal justice reform. In fact,preliminary data from the Department of Justice shows that the prison population increased for the first time in almost a decade between 2021 and 2022.

In an effort to protect and expand the progress, The Sentencing Project is producing the "One in Five" series of four reports to examine both the narrowing and persistence of racial injustice in the criminal legal system, as well as to highlight promising reforms.

International

German Marijuana Legalization Debate Delayed Because of Israel-Hamas War. The Bundestag was set to take up debate on a government-backed bill to legalize marijuana Friday, but that debate is now delayed because of the ongoing fighting between Israel and Hamas.

The "global political situation" is the reason for the delay, said lawmakers Carmen Wegge and Dirk Heidenblut of the Social Democratic Party, but lawmakers "will make sure that everything gets done somehow in the next week."

But Thorsten Frei, a member of the minority Christian Democratic Union -- not a member of the governing coalition -- said the debate cancellation was "surprising" and reflected internal concerns about the bill more than foreign wars.

Any delay could make it more difficult to get the bill passed by a December 15 deadline, and if that does not happen, further consideration would be pushed back to next February at the earliest. But a revised parliamentary schedule suggests that it could get done by mid-November.