Continuing Support for Prescription Drug Monitoring Program, McCaskill Advocates for County-Level Funding

Senator supports St. Louis County grant application, network of PDMPs covering nearly half of population

WASHINGTON – Following her successful work to ensure county and municipal level prescription drug monitoring programs would be eligible for federal funds, U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill lent her support to the St. Louis County monitoring program grant application, which includes programs from thirteen additional cities and counties across the state and covers nearly half of Missouri’s population.

“This work is essential in combatting the opioid epidemic not only in Missouri, but for neighboring states in which Missouri becomes a loophole in their efforts to detect prescription abuse,” wrote McCaskill, a former Jackson County prosecutor, in a letter to the Department of Justice. “Funds from the grant will provide resources to cover subscribing county participation costs and support provider county, and system-level reporting.”

Missouri is currently the only state in the country without a statewide prescription drug monitoring program. The motion shaped by McCaskill that was successfully included in last year’s Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act—federal legislation that provides resources to states to combat the number of prescription drug and heroin deaths across the country—enables Missouri’s network of county-level monitoring programs to be eligible to apply for federal resources. Without this provision, eligibility for this federal grant funding would have been limited to states.

In addition to St. Louis County, the network of monitoring programs included in the first phase of implementation: the City of Columbia, City of Independence, Cole County, Cooper County, Jackson County, Jefferson City, Kansas City, Lincoln County, Miller County, St. Charles County, Ste. Genevieve County, St. Louis City, and Stoddard County. This network covers 49 percent of the population and 70 percent of all providers in the state.

Following the passage of a statewide prescription drug monitoring program bill by the Missouri House of Representatives, McCaskill—an outspoken advocate for such a program—called on the State Senate to swiftly pass the bill.

Last week, McCaskill announced a wide-ranging investigation into opioid manufacturers to explore whether pharmaceutical manufacturers—at the head of the opioids pipeline—have contributed to opioid overutilization and overprescription as overdose deaths in the last fifteen years have approached nearly 200,000. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, deaths from opioids, including prescription opioids and heroin, reached over 30,000 in 2015 alone, and sales of prescription opioids have quadrupled since 1999.

Full text of letter HERE.

Visit mccaskill.senate.gov/opioids for information and resources related to Missouri’s opioid epidemic.

###