Trumbull Lawmakers Prioritize Opiate Addiction Prevention Legislation

Trumbull and Fairfield lawmakers will take community suggestions into consideration as they put forward ways to curb opiate addiction.

State Reps. David Rutigliano (R-123), Brenda Kupchick (R-132), Laura Devlin (R-134) and Ben McGorty (R-122) said they will take suggestions from a legislative forum held last month and put many into bill proposals.

“We owe it our constituents to be proactive about this epidemic,” Rutigliano said. “These proposals look at the many facets of opiate addiction and the ambiguities in state law.”

The following ideas came up at the forum:

• Advocating drug education health education courses in earlier grades in schools
• Requiring drug testing to be conducted prior to the refill of certain prescriptions
• Prohibiting doctors from prescribing an excessive amount of medication when it is not necessary for the treatment of the patient and that shall also apply to insurance companies
• Establishing a crime of murder by sale of an opiod controlled substance to hold drug dealers liable for the sale of drugs that result in the death of the person who purchased the drugs from the dealer
• Making Narcan available to all so families may access Narcan at pharmacies over the counter
• Allowing for drug “dropboxes” in pharmacies. Dropboxes shall accept unused drugs
• Requiring methadone clinics to verify that a client is “drug free” before dispensing any medication to the client
• Requiring doctors who prescribe opiates to qualify for a “rider” or “endorsement” on their medical license that allows them to prescribe opiates after completing addiction continuing education

“This first meeting allowed us to listen and learn and put together proposals we hope will be helpful in fighting against the opiate addiction epidemic,” Kupchick said. “I’ve been personally impacted by this issue and want to help families and their addicted loved ones before it’s too late.”

Devlin said the proposals came from common sense and are a good way to curb the destruction of opiates in the state.

McGorty called the forum an educational experience and said he is ready to take the proposals to Hartford.