The Mi’kmaq Nation in Maine spent about $50,000 in opioid resettlement funds to build a healing hut for traditional sweating ceremonies to help people recover from drug addiction.
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The Mi’kmaq Nation in Maine spent about $50,000 in opioid resettlement funds to build a healing hut for traditional sweating ceremonies to help people recover from drug addiction.
Aneri Pattani/KFF Health News
PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — There is a dome-shaped tent outside the Mi’kmaq Nation’s health department, hand-built from saplings and covered with black canvas. It’s one of several sweat lodges on tribal land, but this one is dedicated to helping people recover from drug addiction.
Up to 10 people can enter the cabin at the same time. Stones heated by the fire – called grandmother and grandfather because they represented the spirit – were brought inside. Water splashed on the stones and the cabin filled with steam. It feels like a sauna, but hotter. The air became heavier and the sky became darker. People prayed and sang. It is said that when they leave the hut, they re-emerge from their mother’s womb. Cleansed. Rebirth.
Edward Peter Paul was chief of the Mi’kmaw tribe in Maine. A sweat ritual helped him improve his relationship with drugs and alcohol decades ago. He hopes the new healing cabin will do the same for other tribal citizens.
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Edward Peter Paul was chief of the Mi’kmaw tribe in Maine. A sweat ritual helped him improve his relationship with drugs and alcohol decades ago. He hopes the new healing lodge will do the same for other tribal citizens.
Aneri Pattani/KFF Health News
Katie Espling, health director for the tribe of about 2,000 members, said the experience can be an “important tool” in the healing process.
She said recovering patients have requested sweat lodges for years as a cultural element to supplement the counseling and medications already provided by tribal health departments. But insurance doesn’t cover sweat ceremonies, so until now, the department has been unable to offer them.
Last year, the Mi’kmaw Nation received more than $150,000 from settlements with companies that manufactured or sold prescription painkillers and were accused of fueling the overdose crisis. A third of that money was spent on sweat lodges.
higher mortality rate
Over 15 years, health care companies have paid more than $1.5 billion to hundreds of tribes. The windfall is similar to settlements paid to states by many of the same companies, totaling about $50 billion.
To some, tribes’ lower spending corresponds to their smaller populations. But some tribal citizens note that the overdose crisis has disproportionately impacted their communities. From 2020 to 2022, Native Americans experienced the highest annual overdose death rate of any racial group. was misclassified.
Still, many tribal leaders are grateful for the settlement and the unique way the funds are used: Unlike state payments, funds sent to tribes can be spent on traditional and cultural healing practices—from sweat lodges and smudging ceremonies to basket making and projects Teach tribal languages.
“It’s really a gift to have these dollars to do this,” said Esplin of the Mi’kmaw Tribe. “It’s absolutely critical to the well-being of our patients” because of the cultural connection with them. “That’s where they really find their deepest healing.”
Public health experts say the root cause of addiction in many tribal communities is intergenerational trauma caused by centuries of brutal treatment, including treaty violations, land theft and a government-funded boarding school system designed to erase tribes’ languages and culture. Combined with a chronic lack of investment in India’s health services, these factors have led to lower life expectancy and increased rates of addiction, suicide and chronic disease.
Andrea Medley, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Indigenous Health and a member of the Haida Nation, said using resettlement funds to connect tribal citizens to their traditions and reinvigorate pride in their culture could Becomes a powerful healing tool. She helped develop principles for how tribes should consider using resettlement funds.
Respecting those traditional elements clearly outlined in the settlement “is really groundbreaking,” Medley said.
“drop in the ocean”
More than 300 of the 574 federally recognized tribes have now received payments totaling more than $371 million, said Kevin Washburn, one of three court-appointed administrators responsible for tribal reconciliation. Dollar.
While that sounds like a large sum, it pales in comparison to the toll the addiction crisis is taking on the tribe. Hundreds more tribes have been excluded from the payments because they are not recognized by the federal government.
“These abatement funds are a drop in the bucket compared to what they’re spending and what they’re expected to spend,” said Corey Hinton, a Passamaquoddy tribal citizen and an attorney who represents several tribes in opioid litigation. “‘Mitigation’ is a cheap term when we’re talking about a crisis that is still engulfing and destroying communities.”
Even the leader of the Navajo Nation, the largest federally recognized tribe in the United States that has received $63 million so far, said the settlements would not be commensurate with the severity of the crisis.
“It’s going to have a little impact, but it’s going to be limited,” said Kim Russell, executive director of the Navajo Department of Health.
The Navajo Nation is trying to use the funding to improve its overall health system. Officials plan to use the money to hire more coding and billing staff for tribal-run hospitals and clinics. Russell said the staff will help ensure reimbursements continue to flow to the health system and will help maintain and expand services, including addiction treatment and prevention.
Navajo leaders also want to hire more clinicians who specialize in substance abuse treatment, as well as primary care physicians, nurses and epidemiologists.
Russell said building from the Opioid Settlement Fund “is not what we want.” “We are building a nation.”
Small tribes are at high risk
Small nations like the Poarch Band of Creek Indians in southern Alabama are also developing strategies to make reconciliation funds go further.
For the tribe of about 2,900 members, that means investing $500,000 (most of the funding the tribe has received so far) into a statistical modeling platform that its creators say will simulate the opioid crisis, predicting which projects will save the most lives and helping local officials decide the most effective uses of cash from future settlements.
Robert McGhee is Vice Chairman of the Poarch Band of Alabama Creek Indians. The tribe has put its opioid settlement funds into a statistical modeling platform designed to help them invest their future funds wisely.
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Robert McGhee is Vice Chairman of the Poarch Band of Alabama Creek Indians. The tribe has put its opioid settlement funds into a statistical modeling platform designed to help them invest their future funds wisely.
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Some recovery advocates question the value of the model, but Robert McGhee, the tribe’s vice president, said it would provide the data and evidence needed to make choices among efforts to compete for resources, such as recovery housing or peer support. expert. The tribe wants to have both, but really, it has to take precedence.
“If we can have this model and put the necessary money into it and get the support, it will work for us,” McGee said. “I just feel it in my gut.”
The stakes are high. In smaller communities, each death affects the entire tribe, McGee said. The death of a leader marks the loss of decades of knowledge. The death of the speaker means further erosion of the mother tongue.
For Keesha Frye, who oversees tribal courts and sober living facilities for the Poarch Band of Creek Indians, using settlement funds effectively is a personal matter. “Making this community a better place means a lot to me because this is where I live and this is where my family lives,” she said.
Erik Lamoreau of Maine also brought a personal connection to the work. He sold drugs on Mi’kmaq land more than a decade ago to support his addiction.
“I did a disservice to this community and it’s important for me to come back and try to right some of those wrongs,” Lamoreau said.
Erik Lamoreau is the Peer Rehabilitation Coordinator for the Mi’kmaw Nation Health Department. Note his license plate.
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Erik Lamoreau is the Peer Rehabilitation Coordinator for the Mi’kmaw Nation Health Department. Note his license plate.
Aneri Pattani/KFF Health News
Today, he works with the tribe as a peer recovery coordinator, a new role created by the Opioid Settlement Fund. He uses his experience to connect with others and help them recover – whether that means taking someone to court, revamping their resume, working out together at the gym, or hosting a card club where people can play card games and Socialize without worrying.
Starting this month, Lamoreau’s job will also include connecting clients seeking elements of cultural healing with new sweat lodge services — work he says is promising.
“The more in tune you are with your culture, no matter what it is, it connects you to something bigger,” Lamoreau said. “When we’re in recovery, when we talk about spiritual connection, that’s really It’s more important than you.”
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism on health issues as one of the agency’s core operating programs Cave.
