NIH to Increase Opioid and Pain Research by $500 Million

A PPM Brief

As part of the federal government’s focus on opioids, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has announced a funding increase of $500 million to focus on research aimed at opioid misuse, addiction, and pain. The fiscal year 2016 budget of $600 million will grow to $1.1 billion for fiscal 2018.

NIH Director Francis Collins, MD, said in an announcement that the initiative, called Helping to End Addiction Long-term (HEAL), will focus on ways to “reduce over-prescription of opioids, accelerate development of effective non-opioid therapies for pain, and provide more flexible options for treating opioid addiction.” 

FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, added “the number of prescriptions being written is still too high,” adding that “in too many cases, addiction still starts with a prescriber’s pen, either directly or indirectly through prescription drugs left over, and acquired or stolen from friends or family members.”

In October 2019, the NIH announced the award of $945 million in 2019 funding to battle the opioid epidemic through the HEAL Initiative.