Opioid Overdose Prevention Studies

In 2019 University Professor Nabila El-Bassel received an $86 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to contribute to a multi-year, multi-site, trans-agency effort to speed scientific solutions to stem the national opioid crisis, with the goal of reducing opioid overdose fatalities by at least 40 percent within less than four years. She and her team—including social workers, public health researchers, data scientists, psychiatrists, and medical researchers—were assigned the task of designing a rapid public health response to the opioid epidemic in 16 heavily affected counties across New York State.

She and her team—including social workers, public health researchers, data scientists, psychiatrists, and medical researchers—were assigned the task of designing a rapid public health response to the opioid epidemic in 16 heavily affected counties across New York State. This past academic year, the Columbia-led team began laying the groundwork for their ambitious statewide study. In addition, El-Bassel joined forces with colleagues at several other Columbia schools to launch a new center, called CHOSEN, to combat substance use disorders in New York City and New York State. Please follow the links to read more about these two high-level, Columbia-wide initiatives.