Combating the Heroin and Opioid Epidemic

Floor Speech

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Mr. CARTER of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for holding this Special Order to discuss such an important issue.

Mr. Speaker, as a lifelong pharmacist, I have experienced firsthand the struggles that medical professionals and Americans face with prescription drug abuse. Many don't realize, but medical professionals are not immune to prescription drug abuse. I have had several colleagues in the pharmacy profession who have struggled with prescription drug abuse.

In addition, I was the cosponsor in the Georgia General Assembly when the Georgia Prescription Drug Monitoring Program was created. I believe that PDMPs are one of the most important tools in the fight against prescription drug abuse. As a pharmacist, I experienced several customers who would walk into my store with an out-of-State driver's license. As you can imagine, I was a little hesitant to fill a prescription of someone who has a Kentucky driver's license when my store is in south Georgia.

I believe the best way to address this issue is to work as a team. Physicians, nurses, pharmacists, and anyone else who is part of an individual's medical team has a role to play. We must work together if we want to win against this powerful epidemic.

In addition, community leaders, community service centers, and any other entity that is involved in community health has a role to play. We must all work together as a community to help people who are struggling with addiction.

I encourage all of my colleagues to get involved in this issue. It is one that will destroy your communities and its families from the inside out, and you won't know you have a problem until it is almost too big to fight.

Again, I want to thank the gentleman from New Hampshire for holding this Special Order. I hope we can continue to work together on this issue because this work will never be done.

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