Photo by Casey Junkins Participating in a panel discussion about how drug addiction is affecting Ohio on Tuesday at the Noble County Community Center in Caldwell, from left, are Noble County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Allen Fraley, county Department of Job and Family Services Director Mindy Lowe, and Caldwell Exempted Village School Superintendent Kacey Cottrill.

CALDWELL, Ohio — Because some of their parents use heroin, fentanyl, methamphetamine or other drugs, 22 children from one small Ohio county have been pulled from their homes in favor of foster care placement since the beginning of the year.

This is particularly troubling for Noble County Department of Job and Family Services Director Mindy Lowe, as the county of about 14,000 residents features only one foster home. She said each of the 22 cases of children being removed from their homes involved drug abuse.

“Our one foster home has five siblings in it right now,” Lowe said Tuesday. “We have to house some of them in Youngstown, Cambridge and other places. That just puts more pressure on our very limited resources.”

Lowe added that methamphetamine, although it is not an opioid, continues to be a major problem for southeastern Ohio. She participated in a panel discussion Tuesday at the Noble County Community Center, which Ohio State University officials organized. OSU President Michael Drake, who holds a medical degree, traveled to Caldwell to participate.

Lowe said in 2012, prior to the county’s uptick in drug abuse, the county’s foster care bill for the entire year was $31,000. Through the first five months of this year, she said this cost is already $135,000, reflecting a more than four-fold increase since 2012 — with seven months still remaining in 2017.

“I’m not sure how we’re going to sustain that,” Lowe said, adding she knows it would be difficult for the already struggling county to support a levy to help pay for foster care. “I don’t know what to do.”

Lowe also said the children who are removed from their homes end up being more likely to face problems of their own as they mature due to the instability they endure.

“Every time you move a child, it’s a disruptive life event for them,” she said.

Lowe said her agency continues to see problems with drug overdoses, as she said there were eight such episodes over the past weekend. Fortunately, none of these proved fatal, she said.

“It’s an addiction. We don’t have clinics here,” she said.

Although none of the recent overdoses resulted in death, Noble County Health Commissioner Shawn Ray said five individuals in the county died of overdoses in 2016.

“We have a flood of drugs. This is not a flash flood. The waters are still up. The devastation is still at hand,” Ray said in comparing the drug epidemic to a flood the county once endured.

Lowe and County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Allen Fraley said the county really only has about 12,000 residents because the official population of about 14,000 — as indicated by the U.S. Census Bureau — includes inmates at the Noble Correctional Institution.

“The last thing an Appalachian county in this state needs is an epidemic,” Fraley said. “We lose that person as a productive member of society.”

Noble County Commissioner Ty Moore said one of the best ways to help local children avoid drug addiction is to give them something positive to do. He showed up at the discussion in between work sessions to finish the new county swimming pool, which he said will assist in this.

“We have to keep the kids away from the drugs. We need to have a place for them to go to get away from it,” he said.

Ohio Rep. Andy Thompson, R-Marietta, said, “This is unlike anything we’ve seen.”

“There has been an explosion with the pills — the abundance and the availability,” he added. “Having the resources of Ohio State working with us is a big help.”

Nancy Snook, OSU Extension educator for Noble County, said part of problem is that drug addiction typically has criminal consequences.

“It is a disease and needs to be treated as a disease,” she said.