Substance Use-Disorder Prevention That Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment for Patients and Communities Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. CLARK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I thank the ranking member for yielding and for all his work on this issue and continuing to underscore the need to actually fund access to healthcare so that we can curb this horrible epidemic in a meaningful way.

One of the many factors that contributes to the opioid crisis is the sheer volume of opioids in circulation. According to the CDC, over 214 million prescriptions were written for opioids in 2016, and we can see that in our own Federal programs.

A 2016 study showed that one in three Medicare part D recipients received opioids. That is almost 80 million prescriptions for a cost of $4.1 billion. The sheer volume makes it hard to prevent abuse, addiction, waste, and fraud. Almost 90,000 beneficiaries of Medicare are at serious risk for abuse and overdose, receiving over 2\1/2\ times the recommended dosing. This study eliminated anyone who is on hospice care. Additionally, 70,000 recipients receive an extreme amount of opioids. That is the equivalent of 24 Vicodin every single day.

That is why I, along with my colleague, Markwayne Mullin, have introduced the Every Prescription Conveyed Securely Act. This bill will require that every prescription written for a Medicare part D beneficiary be prescribed electronically by 2021. We know this technology will save lives by making it harder to forge prescriptions, easier for doctors to know if a patient is doctor shopping, and be able to prevent fraud and save the government money.

Mr. Chairman, this is a commonsense bill that can help fight the opioid crisis. I am very grateful to Chairman Walden and the ranking member for including it in this package.

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