Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin has persuaded his fellow governors to push for new protocols in their states for physicians prescribing painkiller drugs. Shumlin says too many doctors have handed them out like candy in recent years.
Shumlin won passage over the weekend of a motion at the National Governors Association to work on setting up new protocols.
The motion was followed by a joint statement Monday from the American Medical Association and Governors Charlie Baker of Massachusetts and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire. They are chairman and vice chairwoman of the NGA’s Health and Human Services Committee.
The statement commits the doctors and governors to working together to support prescription drug monitoring programs and to take other steps to stem overuse of opiates.
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