The least you need to know about the Senate HELP committee opioid bill

The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) passed S. 2680, the Opioid Crisis Response Act of 2018, on Tuesday. By the way, the bill passed unanimously and should expect a decent rally of bipartisan support.

Lots more to come on this, but here is the absolute least you need to know about what S. 2680 would do:

• Reauthorize 21st Century Cures grants for three more years.
• Help states make more progress on data sharing with their PDMPs.
• Put FDA and NIH on task to make non-addictive painkillers a reality and also to get more addiction-treatment medications to market.
• Prompt FDA to drive short-duration opioid prescriptions with new manufacturer packaging.
• Get HHS and HUD on task to create recovery housing best practices.
• Help border protection folks find illegal drugs.
• Make DEA figure out the pathway for medication-assisted treatment with telemedicine.  
• Authorize labor grants targeted to the behavioral health workforce—including loan repayment.
• Organize a task force for trauma best practices.

Click here for a detailed summary of the legislation.