(TRENTON) – Legislation Assembly Democrats Joseph Lagana, Marlene Caride, John McKeon and Vincent Mazzeo sponsored to combat the rising tide of heroin and prescription drug abuse throughout New Jersey was advanced Thursday by an Assembly panel.
The bill (A-3062) would implement recommendations from the State Commission of Investigation’s July 2013 report entitled “Scenes from an Epidemic: A Report on the SCI’s Investigation of Prescription Pill and Heroin Abuse.” The report included testimony from law enforcement officials, drug addicts, members of street gangs and physicians who operated so-called pill mills, where prescription drugs could be obtained under the guise of seemingly legitimate medical practices. The mills often have ties to organized crime, the report stated.
“This problem is wide-ranging and our laws are not stringent enough to combat it,” said Lagana (D-Bergen/Passaic). “We need to do more to ensure we’re equipped to deal with this epidemic, before too many are lost. This is both the moral and responsible thing to do.”
“These recommendations expand on current law in several areas to strengthen the ability of law enforcement agencies to combat illicit drug distribution and drug use, increase civil penalties related to prescription drug abuse and impose stronger controls over access to prescription drugs,” said Caride (D-Bergen/Passaic). “No one and no place in New Jersey is immune to the increasing concern over this abuse, whether it be a city or a suburb, and we need to do more to stem this tide or we risk our state’s future. These common sense ideas should go a long way toward combating this scourge.”
“This epidemic is, in many cases, flagrant and destructive to our future as a state,” said McKeon (D-Essex/Morris). “We’re losing too many people to addiction and illegal activity, and we cannot sit idle and watch it continue without giving law enforcement the tools they need to combat it and provide help to those in need. This bill makes clear that we will not sit back and allow this epidemic to continue.”
“This unbridled epidemic has tainted medical professionals, created scores of addicts and even attracted the tentacles of organized crime,” said Mazzeo (D-Atlantic). “The illegal trafficking in and abuse of prescription painkillers and other addictive narcotics is a threat to our well-being as a state, and these thoughtful recommendations should be a major step toward overcoming it. Too many futures have already been lost. Let’s do the right thing and pass this bill.”
The bill would:
· Make it a crime of the third degree to knowingly design, build, construct or fabricate a motor vehicle equipped with a hidden compartment to be used to unlawfully conceal a controlled dangerous substance, or to alter a motor vehicle to add such a hidden compartment. This section also would make it a crime of the fourth degree to operate or possess a vehicle with a hidden compartment;
· Provide that, in addition to any other penalty provided by law, a health care professional who engages in improper prescribing is liable to a civil penalty of not less than $10,000 for the first violation and not less than $20,000 for the second and each subsequent violation. Current law provides a maximum fine of $10,000 for the first violation and $20,000 for a second or subsequent violation;
· Specify that any prescription and any refill of a prescription is each to be counted as a separate instance of improper prescribing;
· Require pharmacies to submit information on dispensed prescriptions at least once each business day, or according to a schedule to be determined by the Director of the Division of Consumer Affairs if federal law, regulation, or funding eligibility otherwise requires. Pharmacies are currently required by the Division of Consumer Affairs to report once each 15 days; and
· Provide law enforcement agencies greater access to prescription monitoring information.
· Require health care practitioners who prescribe, and pharmacists who dispense, Schedule II drugs to check the information available through the prescription monitoring program prior to prescribing in order to determine if the patient has received other prescriptions that indicate prescription abuse or diversion.
· Grant the Division of Consumer Affairs authority to gather information on any significant business relationships involving the medical practice of a licensee of the State Board of Medical Examiners.
· Direct the State Board of Medical Examiners to adopt regulations setting forth clear standards for the use of prescription drugs in pain management. This section would require that the standards emphasize the primary goal of ensuring that suffering patients find relief, and also consider the need to protect the public health and safety by limiting access to controlled dangerous substances. In developing the standards, the State Board of Medical Examiners would be required to consider the provisions of the model policy established by the Federation of State Medical Boards.
· Require that New Jersey Prescription Blanks incorporate additional security features to prevent erasure or duplication of prescription blanks that can be accomplished with widely available computer technology. It is expected that this provision would encourage the adoption of regulations similar or identical to those proposed by the Division of Consumer Affairs in November 2012. This section also would require the Division of Consumer Affairs to limit the number of vendors as necessary to ensure that vendors are appropriately monitored to ensure that prescription blanks are delivered only to intended prescribers and health care facilities.
The bill was released by the Assembly Judiciary Committee chaired by McKeon.
