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Georgia bill would hold providers criminally liable for not tracking opioid prescriptions

Modern Healthcare: A Georgia state bill requiring healthcare providers to log opioid prescriptions in a state database passed a committee vote last week. The bill would make healthcare providers criminally liable for failing to keep track of the opioid prescriptions they write. It would also make naloxone, an opioid antagonist that can reverse an overdose, available over the counter.

Nationwide, there were more than 22,000 deaths involving prescription opioids in 2015—with 549 in Georgia, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That year, there were 7.8 million opioid painkiller prescriptions written in Georgia. The goal of the legislation, said state Sen. Renee Unterman, the bill's co-author, is to “curb the tide and raise awareness” of opioid addiction.

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