A key Senate committee has unanimously advanced a wide-ranging bill aimed at tackling the opioid epidemic.
The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee voted Tuesday to advance the Opioid Crisis Response Act, a compilation of 40 proposals from members of both parties. The bill includes provisions to reduce illegal drug trafficking, limit the number of pain relievers doctors can prescribe, and channel research toward finding nonaddictive pain medication.
The committee voted down an amendment by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., to penalize drugmakers found to be accountable for causing people to become addicted to prescription painkillers because they falsely marketed their products as non-addictive.
Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat of the committee, voted against the bill but said she wanted to work on the bill’s text.
Sanders said it was necessary to hold drug companies accountable and to have them come to the Capitol for a hearing to answer questions about when they discovered their products were addictive.
“They have got to help this country address the crisis they have created,” Sanders said. “It should not just be the taxpayers.”
The committee also voted down an amendment from Sanders that would have doubled funding for medical first responders.
The committee advanced an amendment by Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., that clarified reporting requirements to make sure that mental and substance abuse services are reimbursed in a similar way as other medical care.
The committee also approved an amendment by Sens. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., that will allow more medical students to learn about how to treat addiction.
Hassan said the committee had more work to do and she wished another provision in the legislation had been included that would have made it permanent for nurse practitioners and physician assistants to prescribe medication to treat addiction.
“We must keep working in a bipartisan way to include this important policy,” she said. “Nurses and physician assistants are vital parts of our healthcare workforce, including in rural and underserved areas, and their prescribing authority should be made permanent.”
The Opioid Crisis Response Act is one of several efforts from Congress, which, along with the Trump administration, has been working to find solutions to reverse overdose-related deaths and addiction in the U.S. that are tied to opioids such as heroin and prescription painkillers. Opioid-overdose deaths surpassed 42,000 in 2016.
“Ultimately [the opioid crisis] is not something that can be solved by an agency in Washington, D.C.,” HELP Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander said at the beginning of the meeting. “What we can do is take a number of steps so that everyone — judges, mayors, counselors, police officers, Drug Enforcement Administration agents, doctors, nurses, parents, pharmacists, and hospitals — can succeed in fighting the crisis community by community,” Alexander said.
He said he hoped the Senate could move on the legislation this summer.
Murray said the bill is an example of “listening to each other and looking for common ground.”
Other bills moved forward in committee Tuesday, including the Over-the-Counter Drug Safety, Innovation, and Reform Act, which was introduced by Sens. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., and Bob Casey, D-Pa.
The bill would overhaul how over-the-counter medicines are regulated and brought to the market. It would for the first time allow the Food and Drug Administration to collect user fees on over-the-counter drugs, which proponents say would encourage the development of new products and cause new medicines to come to market faster. The way over-the-counter medicines are currently monitored has been in place since 1972, and critics say it is outdated and could cause harm. The legislation authorizes the Department of Health and Human Services to take action when safety issues arise.
Casey and Isakson are behind another bill that advanced Tuesday, the Children’s Hospital GME Support Reauthorization Act, which would reauthorize a hospital graduate medical education program for pediatricians for five years. The legislation was enacted in 1999 and provides funding to more than 50 children’s hospitals.
The committee also advanced the Firefighter Cancer Registry Act, which would create a national registry for firefighters who have been diagnosed with cancer. Research shows that firefighters who are exposed to harmful toxins through their work have an increased risk for several types of cancer, including testicular, stomach, and brain cancers. The legislation was introduced by Sens. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Robert Menendez, D-N.J.
