BOSTON (AP) – Attorney General Maura Healey is planning to announce a new front in the state’s ongoing battle with opioid abuse.
Healey is joining with federal and state agencies on Wednesday to detail new efforts to crack down on the illegal prescribing and dispensing of opioids in Massachusetts.
The Democrat will be joined at the afternoon press conference by state Auditor Suzanne Bump and representatives of the FBI, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Healey and others have pointed to the overprescribing of prescription opioid painkillers as a key factor in the state’s alarming spike in the number of opioid-related overdoses and deaths.
The Massachusetts House last week approved a bill that would limit initial opiate painkiller prescriptions to a seven-day supply.
I wonder if this will really accomplish anything more than a bit of political theatre.
For example, I’d like to know just how many initial prescriptions are currently being written for more than this amount. 10%? 20%? 50%? And what about people who have chronic conditions in which drugs like these are the only—or let’s say the “preferred”—method of dealing with their pain? They continue to take these prescription drugs as recommended by their doctor. Do they have a choice?
Not all people who take these drugs as prescribed become addicted. Why is that? Does our Attorney General know? Does anyone know? If not, would that not be a worthwhile subject of scientific investigation?
And perhaps the Attorney General can announce that study’s findings at a press conference. I would be interested in watching that one.
Unfortunately, I suspect that most people who become addicted to these drugs do so by choice. They willingly, knowingly take them. Period. They’re driving that train wreck; they’re not just innocent passengers along for the ride. And we certainly all know by now that that is a prescription for disaster.