Drug industry lobbyists won. Minnesotans lost. That's the brutal bottom line on this year's legislative fight to better fund opioid addiction treatment and prevention while the public health crisis caused by painkillers rages across the state.
As the end-of-session fog lifted this week, it became clear that legislators fell appallingly short of shouldering a critical responsibility — creating a fair framework to generate the dollars needed to help struggling families and communities. This failure is even more frustrating given that a measure that would have accomplished this — one that would have levied a $20-million-a-year drug industry "registration fee" — had already overwhelmingly passed the state Senate.
But the registration fee failed to make it into legislation that Republican leaders sent to Gov. Mark Dayton this past weekend. Instead, the final opioid measure not only underfunds the fight against this epidemic, it also gives drug companies a pass when it comes to financial accountability.
The state's opioid response now calls for $16.2 million in general fund dollars to be spread out over the next three years vs. the $20 million that would have been raised annually with the registration fee, which was admirably championed by Sen. Julie Rosen, R-Vernon Center.
As for the drug companies whose deceptive marketing fueled this deadly epidemic? Their lobbyists descended on St. Paul to fight Rosen's sensible fee. They earned their big paychecks when Minnesota Republican legislative leaders chose to ask the industry for nothing. Taxpayers, in other words, get the bill to clean up after the crisis, while the companies that caused it get to skate.
It is a contemptible outcome. New York boldly passed a requirement this year that drug companies pay $100 million toward opioid treatment and prevention. Minnesota asked for a reasonable sum given its smaller population. But Republican leaders still bowed to lobbyists even after Rosen had fiercely fought to shepherd her measure through the Senate.
About 400 Minnesotans die each year from opioid-related overdoses. Voters, if your elected leaders can't stand up to the drug industry in the teeth of this epidemic, when will they ever have a backbone?
As hard as it is to believe, the situation is worse than it appears. The opioid measure was not sent to Dayton as a stand-alone bill, as it should have it been. It is instead part of a sprawling supplemental budget bill containing many objectionable provisions and may be vetoed. That puts the $16 million for opioid measures at risk and also jeopardizes other smaller but worthy advances, such as prescribing limits for these medications.
