[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 5]
[House]
[Pages 6150-6151]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1210
                        PRESCRIPTION DRUG ABUSE

  (Mr. HIGGINS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. HIGGINS. Mr. Speaker, in a devastating trend the Centers for 
Disease Control is calling a public health epidemic, prescription drug 
death rates in the United States have more than tripled since 1990. In 
a strange twist of fate, addictive prescription painkillers are killing 
our children, causing a lifetime of pain for grief-stricken parents.
  This week, the parents of Michael David Israel join other parents on 
Capitol Hill to call for changes to prevent these tragedies. The 
Centers for Disease Control is recommending the implementation of 
prescription drug monitoring programs, State-run electronic databases 
used to track the dispensing of controlled drugs to patients. States 
must move quickly to implement this technology, and the Federal 
Government should support this commonsense transition to electronic 
medical records.
  Avi and Julie Israel and other parents in Washington this week have 
shown amazing strength despite unthinkable sorrow. Their pain will 
never

[[Page 6151]]

be relieved, but we have an obligation to move quickly to ``Save the 
Michaels of the World.''

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