Gov. Peter Shumlin and the Democratic leaders in the Legislature touted an omnibus drug abuse bill as one of the most important pieces of legislation passed this year. H.522 addresses problems stemming from opioid and methamphetamine abuse from several different angles.
● The bill’s centerpiece is an effort to revitalize the Vermont Prescription Monitoring System, the statewide online database that allows physicians and pharmacists to track prescriptions, alerting them to signs of doctor-shopping. Participation, which is voluntary, has been lackluster.
Only 36 percent of doctors who are licensed to prescribe controlled substances are registered to use the VPMS and among these 1,881 doctors, there isn’t data on how many actively use the database. Some 163 of 400 in-state pharmacists are registered.
H. 522 requires doctors to register with the VPMS by Nov. 15, 2013, and it sets minimum standards for when they must consult the database. It also paves the way for the Department of Health to share information with databases in neighboring states as long as adhere to certain privacy and security standards.
● The bill sets up a pilot program to distribute drugs that can reverse opioid overdoses to people who are at risk of an overdose, as well as their family and friends. Currently in Vermont, only physicians and paramedics can administer these “opioid antagonists.”
● It requires people to show a valid ID before buying allergy medicines, such as Sudafed, which contain active ingredients that can be used to make methamphetamine. It also requires pharmacies to use a free electronic database to record all sales of these products. The provision sunsets after three years, in response to privacy concerns raised by the Vermont ACLU.
● It tasks the Department of Health with implementing a statewide drug disposal program by July 2014, allowing people to discard unused prescriptions at no cost.
● It makes it easier to designate a place as “abandoned property,” which lawmakers hope will, in turn, make it easier for law enforcement to crack down on drug activity.
● The bill calls for several studies. One will examine the effect methamphetamine production can have on housing. Another will look at how to regulate precious metal dealers to crack down on the sale of stolen property used to fuel drug addictions. The bill also makes slight changes to the recordkeeping requirements for pawnbrokers.
● H.65 is a separate piece of legislation that gives limited immunity from a narrow set of offenses — parole violation or procuring alcohol for someone under 21, for example— for people who seek medical attention for some who has overdosed. The hope is that this will encourage more reporting of these events.
