March 8, 2023

Over the past several weeks the NYS Council has sent our members lots of information from the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) as well as analysis from several experts who have analyzed recently proposed Rules (from DEA) regarding the future of tele prescribing after the Public Health Emergency ends on 5/11/23.  If you missed any of that information, reach out to me and I will share it with you.

In the meantime, here’s an article from Politico that links to a longer article that speaks to the inhouse conflicts that inform the recent Rule from DEA that may/may not run parallel to the stated objectives of the Biden Administration.

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Federal agencies may be working at cross purposes in their fight against the opioid epidemic, Krista and our Ben Leonard report.

The Biden administration is implementing a new law to make it easier to prescribe drugs to treat opioid use disorder — even as one of its agencies, the Drug Enforcement Administration, subjects the drug to such strict regulation that many are reluctant to dispense it.

That leaves doctors scrambling to stop people from dying in America’s unyielding opioid crisis, say Biden administration officials are working at cross purposes in their fight to reverse record numbers of fatal drug overdoses.

The administration is in the midst of enforcing a law enacted in December that eliminates a requirement that practitioners go through time-consuming training to prescribe buprenorphine, which helps wean patients from dangerous opioids. It also lifted restrictions on the number of patients doctors could treat with the drug.

But buprenorphine is itself an opioid, and the DEA controls its access — though a spokesperson said the agency supports the new law.

Still, the standing policies have dissuaded doctors from prescribing the drug and pharmacies from carrying it, leaving treatment advocates to call for more action.