Community Recovery Organization Expands Peer-based Recovery Supports in Philadelphia Through Grant Award from the Independence Blue Cross Foundation
Unity Recovery, a peer-based recovery community organization in Philadelphia, announced today the award of $50,000 in grant funding through the Independence Blue Cross (IBX) Foundation’s Supporting Treatment and Overdose Prevention (STOP) initiative. The funding will enhance and expand the availability of Unity Recovery’s peer-based community recovery support services to all Philadelphians with opioid and other substance use disorders.
While the country is in the midst of an opioid and overdose crisis, substance use disorders claim the lives of over 70,000 Americans annually. Many who need access to long-term recovery support can’t access it for many reasons. Unity Recovery provides no-cost peer recovery support services to all Philadelphians who desire them and reduces barriers to engagement by offering these services in-person at their Manayunk recovery center and trauma-informed yoga studio, out in the community, or digitally through telerecovery.
Unity Recovery executive director Robert Ashford describes the new partnership with the IBX Foundation project as a game changer. “Recovery supports are lifesaving, when they can be accessed regularly and by anyone who needs them,” says Robert, “Expanding our peer recovery support services ensures that social determinants like transportation, lack of insurance coverage or financial means, don’t prevent individuals and family members from getting the help they need.”
Unity Recovery also received $460,000 in grant funding from the Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs recently, and combined with the newly awarded grant support from the IBX Foundation plans to serve over 1,500 Philadelphians in 2020.
Interested individuals can find out more information at www.UnityRecovery.org. For more information on the IBX Foundation and the STOP initiative: http://www.ibxfoundation.org/grant-programs/stop/
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