FRANKFORT, KY (2/5/12) – Building on his previous work as a state legislator and as Attorney General, House Speaker Greg Stumbo filed legislation on Thursday that would make it easier for law enforcement to target and then stop prescription drug abuse.
“This epidemic truly knows no bounds, and it’s poised to get much worse if we do nothing,” said Speaker Stumbo, D-Prestonsburg. “My approach will help us end the deadly flow of these drugs both now and however the battlefield may change in the future.”
Under his legislation, the state’s nationally recognized KASPER program – which stands for Kentucky All Schedule Prescription Electronic Reporting – would be moved from the Cabinet for Health and Family Services to the Attorney General’s office. In turn, that office, the Kentucky State Police and the state’s medical licensure boards would be called upon to work closely together and share any reports of abuse they discover.
Commonwealth’s Attorneys and County Attorneys would be added to the list of professions that could also access KASPER, and Medicaid would monitor prescribers in their program as well.
All prescribers would be required to register with KASPER, too. According to the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, less than a third of prescribers and less than a fourth of pharmacists had accounts as of 2010. Once registered, prescribers will be required to run KASPER reports on all new patients and periodic checks on those they already see.
To help stop the proliferation of pain clinics, Speaker Stumbo’s legislation would require these businesses to be owned by a licensed physician. Prescribers charged with abusing their prescription privileges, meanwhile, would be barred from providing medicine, and those found guilty – either here or in another state – would see their prescription privileges stripped.
Elsewhere in the legislation, all schedule II and III drugs – which includes powerful pain medicine like Hydrocodone and Oxycontin – would be limited to 30-day supplies. In all cases where overdoses are suspected in a death, coroners would be required to verify whether that was the exact cause.
“Over the last decade, both when I was House Majority Leader and then Attorney General, I have worked to strengthen KASPER and to effectively shut down internet pharmacies from shipping prescription drugs into the state with little to no regulation,” Speaker Stumbo said. “In recent years, however, the problem of prescription drugs has proliferated within our own borders, which is why I took the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure to task last summer.
“Thankfully, KBML has since become much more involved, and hopefully this legislation will give it and law enforcement even greater authority to find where abuse is taking place and stop it,” he added. “We’re seeing hundreds of Kentuckians lose their lives every year to this disease and thousands of others caught in the death spiral of addiction. We cannot afford to wait another year to act.”
SurfKY News
Information provided by Brian Wilkerson
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