Sen. Joe Manchin represents the state with the most drug overdose deaths, putting it at the forefront of the nation’s opioid and heroin epidemic.
The West Virginia Democrat is also perhaps the most conservative Democrat in the nation’s upper chamber. As the senator often does, Manchin hopes to exploit his rare ideological position to gather enough votes to enact reform.
Currently in his sights is the Food and Drug Administration, which Manchin says is asleep at the switch in addressing what is considered the worst drug epidemic since crack cocaine in the 1980s. Manchin proposes revising the FDA’s mission statement to include considering the likelihood of addiction when approving medications.
“There needs to be a cultural change, we got to push that change,” Manchin told the Washington Examiner. “They should be protecting the public, not just basically following the business plan of Big Pharma.”
Manchin faults the FDA for not accounting for how susceptible some approved products are for abuse and dependency. He believes that to find out why, one need only follow the money.
The pharmaceutical industry remains a force of nature in Washington, netting record profits in recent decades. Those returns have not slackened amid the economic downturn.
An FDA spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.
Manchin would add the following language to the FDA mission statement: “The FDA is also responsible for protecting the public health by strongly considering the danger of addiction and overdose death associated with prescription opioid medications when approving these medications and when regulating the manufacturing, marketing and distribution of opioid medications.”
Manchin opposed President Obama’s appointment of Robert Califf as FDA administrator and lambasted the FDA for allowing Oxycontin to be prescribed to children as young as 11.
“When you talk to the policemen anywhere in the United States of America, they’ll tell you that 80 percent of all the problems that they have to respond to are drug-related,” Manchin said.
Manchin said the FDA should have adapted to the opioid crisis naturally and shifted their focus, but he says that is not the case, thus making his legislation necessary.
“So, if you’ve got a problem, and this problem was of big significance — before opiates [became a crisis], wouldn’t you think you have a consumption problem? That you ought to look out and see what you’re approving to go on the market?”
“I would have thought that they did that anyway, but they don’t,” Manchin said. “So I said, we’ll change your mission statement.”
Manchin said he should be able to arrange bipartisan congressional support and administration approval, despite his recent opposition to the president’s FDA nominee.
In particular, Manchin cited a recent tour by Obama of his state, as part of a nationwide outreach on the drug issue, as something that will tilt him in Manchin’s direction.
“The president came to West Virginia … He recognizes the tremendous, tremendous problem, and he came to the state with the biggest problem, the highest death rate per capita,” Manchin said. “I think that he will engage … I think he’ll do it, I really do.”
Before serving in the Senate, Manchin was governor of West Virginia from 2005 to 2010.
In addition to the mission statement proposal, Manchin is championing other opioid epidemic-related reforms as well.
For instance, he proposes a one cent opioid tax “on each milligram of active opioid ingredient in a prescription pain pill … The tax will be on production and import and paid by the manufacturer or importer,” according to amendment language Manchin has introduced to the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act.
The mission statement change is also an amendment to the CARA Act.
