Doctors who prescribe opioids would have to pay for addiction treatment

BOSTON — A new bill on Beacon hill would require doctors who prescribe opioids to pay for addiction treatments if their patients become addicted.

State Representative Peter Capano (D-Lynn) first introduced House Bill 3656 to start a discussion on the topic and says he does not expect the bill to pass in its original form.

"75% of heroin users say they started out with prescription opioids," said Capano.

With that statistic in mind, Capano proposed that doctors bear financial responsability for the drug addicts they, in effect, created.

The bill would mandate doctors prescribing high-strength opioids to pick up the cost of the first 90 days of in-patient hospitalization costs if their patient becomes addicted and subsequently hospitalized.

Opioid prescribing has been declinIng in the US for the last nine years, but the number of days per prescription continues to rise. The CDC says that in 2017 it was up to 18 days.

The average number includes prescriptions for end-of-life care as well as acute pain.

Oponents of the bill, however, argue it would give doctors one more reason not to prescribe pain medications, even to patients who need them.

State Rep. Mike Soter (R-Bellingham) says the bill would further shrink the pool of doctors in Mass. willing to write opioid prescriptions for patients with issues that severely require pain medication, such as chronic pain.

"They're doing the right things, they're not smoking, they're not drinking," said Rep. Soter. "They know the risks of taking chronic pain medicine and how it reacts with other things."

Soter believes prescribed opioids are the wrong target and says the focus should be on illegal fentanyl.

Despite their different stances on the bill, Soter and Capano agree something has to be done about the opioid epidemic.

"Since 2014 there've been 250 people that have died so it's one of the major issues in my district," said Capano.

Having spoken with a constituent, however, Soter says this bill won't cut it.

"You could feel the pain on her, you could see that pain," said Soter. "And I felt it."

Cox Media Group