Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
States Urged To Sue Drug Companies Over Painkiller Epidemic By Lawyers Who Drove Tobacco Litigation
The legal front widening against makers of opioid painkillers has something in common with landmark tobacco litigation of the 1990s: attorney Mike Moore. As Mississippi’s attorney general in 1994, Mr. Moore filed the first state lawsuit against tobacco companies, saying they harmed public-health systems by misrepresenting smoking’s dangers. He helped marshal the subsequent spate of state litigation and then the talks that led to a $246 billion settlement. (Whalen, 7/23)
When McKesson’s board and executives gather near Dallas for their annual shareholders meeting on July 26, they’ll be greeted by a throng of picketing Teamsters. Representatives of the union, which owns more than $30 million of McKesson shares, will call on investors to reject the company’s executive-pay plan and for the board to claw back some of Chief Executive Officer John Hammergren’s compensation. (Melin, 7/21)
State efforts to combat the epidemic are reported from Massachusetts, New Jersey, Virginia, Colorado and Connecticut —
New Jersey is the latest state amid a national opioid crisis to consider allowing police and law enforcement officials to access its prescription drug monitoring database without a court order, pitting patient rights to privacy against the government's ability to investigate so-called doctor shopping. (Catalini, 7/23)
As originally proposed by Governor Charlie Baker, the law would have required those taken to the emergency room after an overdose to be held involuntarily for up to 72 hours to receive treatment. But the final version approved by the Legislature excised that requirement, dictating instead that hospitals must simply offer substance abuse treatment to these patients after a voluntary assessment. (Edmondson, 7/23)
On July 1, a new law legalizing syringe services programs — also known as needle exchanges — went into effect, but none has yet been started. The state Department of Health is awaiting applications from eligible jurisdictions before implementing the programs. (O'Connor, 7/24)
Colorado’s Medicaid program is reducing the amount of opioid painkillers it allows its recipients to receive, part of a growing campaign to restrict how many of the highly addictive drugs are in circulation. The new policy, announced this month, will roll out in two phases. The first, which goes into place in August, applies to Medicaid recipients who are prescribed opioids for the first time in at least a year. The policy will limit those patients to receiving only a seven-day supply to start, with two additional one-week refills possible if the patient requests them. Another refill request beyond that will require additional scrutiny. (Ingold, 7/24)
The need for drug and alcohol treatment services is growing in Connecticut, compounded by a dramatic increase in the number of drug and opioid cases. ...From 2014 to 2015 the drug overdose death rate increased by more than 25 percent in Connecticut, according to the Centers for Disease Control. (Werth, 7/23)
