LifeSkills Training
Aug 23, 2018 12:00 AM
2018-08-23T00:00:00
LifeSkills Training (LST) Program makes economic sense in the fight against Opioid Epidemic:
LST can yield a $45 benefit for every $1 invested
If the saying “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” is correct, then an ounce of LST is actually worth 45 pounds of cure according to a new report by the Promote Prevent Commission, an interdisciplinary group of leaders in behavioral health, prevention, and public health in Massachusetts. The report, formally titled the Behavioral Health Promotion and Upstream Prevention, serves as a behavioral health roadmap for what works in prevention, how to better fund what’s working, and what can be achieved by funding what’s working.
The Promote Prevent Commission partnered with the Pew-MacArthur Foundation Results First Initiative to help determine which government-funded programs have research evidence of improving outcomes for youth and families. Of the universal prevention programs analyzed, the Botvin LifeSkills Training program had the highest cost-benefit ratio as well as evidence rating. For every dollar invested in the LST program, this study found that communities can reap a benefit of $45 in terms of avoided long-term costs of health care utilization and crime due to substance use disorder, as well as wage loss from disrupted employment.