Comment from Hayes, Bridget

Dear Centers for Disease Control, Thank you for the opportunity to comment on CDC–2026–0529. I am a researcher specializing in addiction science at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. I contribute to studies using community-based participatory research processes to examine recovery services for emerging adults receiving medication treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD). I encourage CDC to ensure that information collection activities related to public health/public safety overdose-prevention strategies incorporate perspectives from people with lived and living experience of OUD and substance use recovery. Such perspectives can provide valuable information from current or prior service users regarding how overdose-prevention strategies are experienced by the populations they are intended to serve, including barriers to engagement, service preferences, and unintended consequences of public health and public safety strategies. They may also identify lessons learned that are difficult to capture through routine administrative data collection and may not be fully apparent to organizational stakeholders. Incorporating the perspectives of people with lived and living experience of OUD and substance use recovery can improve the utility, validity, and practical relevance of the information collected. My research experience has demonstrated that it is feasible to engage individuals with OUD to help inform service improvement efforts, such as by constructing standing community boards. My experience has been that people who have lived through OUD are often eager to share their perspectives when given a meaningful opportunity to do so. Sincerely, Bridget B. Hayes Farmington, CT