Senate Easily Passes Sweeping Opioids Legislation, Sending to President Trump

The Senate on Wednesday passed a bipartisan opioids bill for President Trump to sign, setting up, expanding, and reauthorizing programs and policies across nearly all federal agencies, reports the Washington Post . The legislation will mandate that the U.S. Postal Service screen packages for fentanyl shipped from overseas, mainly China. Public-health proponents praise the bill's increased attention to opioid treatment, and its creation of a grant program for comprehensive recovery centers that include housing, job training, and mental and physical healthcare. The measure also would boost access to medication-assisted treatment that helps addicts safely wean themselves off opioids. Furthermore, the bill lifts an obscure rule that has long banned Medicaid from covering beneficiaries with substance abuse disorders who were receiving treatment in a mental health center with more than 16 beds, by now permitting 30 days of residential treatment coverage. "This legislation edges us closer to treating addiction as the devastating disease it is, but it neglects to provide the long-term investment we've seen in responses to other major public health crises," said Lindsey Vuolo at the Center on Addiction. "We won't be able to make meaningful progress against the tide of addiction unless we make significant changes to incorporate addiction treatment into the existing healthcare system."