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GOP backs measures to curb heroin and opioid abuse in weekly message

First State Republicans are getting behind efforts to address heroin and opioid abuse in Delaware.

In the weekly GOP message, state representative Tim Dukes says Republican lawmakers support the Delaware Department of State’s new proposed regulations to tighten the prescription of opioid pain killers – and will help enact companion laws to enlist the help of doctors and technology to stem the tide of abuse.

We need to take immediate action," said Dukes.  "This drug epidemic, it affects every person and every community.  You would find it hard to go out and find someone who has not been impacted by someone’s abuse of heroin or opioids.  And we have got to continue the fight to make a change and a difference in Delaware."

He adds lawmakers also recently created a Drug Overdose Fatality Review Commission to investigate all overdose deaths involving prescription opioids, fentanyl and heroin occurring in Delaware.  The goal is to develop more information that can help develop more ways to battle abuse.

Full text of GOP weekly message:

A lot of times people get addicted to a painkiller because of an injury or something and what they find out once they can’t get that prescription anymore, they have to find something else and heroin is a cheap drug.

Heroin abuse and overdoses, it affects every small town and every major city and in our state.  

Personally, I’ve lost several friends.  One guy died 23 months ago.  We had a great relationship.  We had played softball together.  We did missions work together.  He relapsed, got bad heroin, overdosed.  Ironically, it was the same day we passed the Narcon bill, which is the chemical used to bring someone back from an overdose.

The last statistic I saw, there is one person dying every other day in the State of Delaware.  It is an epidemic that if this was traffic accidents or food poisoning or anything else like that, everyone would be up in arms screaming about it. 

A few days ago, the Department of State proposed new regulations to tighten the prescription of opioid pain killers like Percocet and Vicodin.  We will be enacting a couple of companion law to go along with this.  The idea is to enlist the help of doctors and technology to spot potential issues and stem the tide of abuse.

We also just enacted a measure to establish the Drug Overdose Fatality Review Commission to investigate and review all overdose deaths involving prescription opioids, fentanyl and heroin occurring in Delaware.  Hopefully this will give use some of the facts we need to take additional steps later.

We need to take immediate action.  This drug epidemic, it affects every person and every community.  You would find it hard to go out and find someone who has not been impacted by someone’s abuse of heroin or opioids.  And we have got to continue the fight to make a change and a difference in Delaware.