Kristen Anthony Cabezas was a Fort Bend County Jail inmate when he suffered a seizure. A jailer reported the medical episode, and the inmate was transported to local Richmond, Texas, medical facility Oak Bend Hospital. Tragically, Mr. Cabezas died on March 23, 2022. He was 40 years old.

A major expense that every county jail faces in current times is the cost of housing addicted inmates. Approximately 60% of all the people in US jails and prisons have substance-use disorders” (SUDs). One type of addiction stands out among them all–there is an opioid epidemic across the nation. Approximately 1/3 of the individuals who have an opioid addiction land in jail each year.

Medication-assisted treatment is now referred to as “medications for opioid use disorder” or MOUD, and there is much controversy surrounding the fact that it is not available to save lives in jails everywhere.

Methadone, naltrexone, and buprenorphine are recognized as lifesaving treatments for opioid-addicted inmates. Cost is a major barrier that prevents these effective treatments from being authorized for use. However, watchdog groups in the medical field claim that it is feasible to provide inmates with access to the medication treatments proven to save the lives of people suffering from opioid-use disorder.

Learn more in Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 of this ongoing series.

Seemingly making any type of suggestion on this website that a person or organization is engaged in wrongs is entirely unintentional. Each of the posts on this site is a resource meant to help inmates now or previously detained in a Texas county jail.

–Guest Contributor