The Missouri Legislature may take an annual seven-month break, but the effort to put your prescription drug use into a government database continues. Over the past month, proponents of a prescription drug monitoring program for Missouri have been busy pressing the issue with the media. They've garnered positive press in many outlets - including the News Tribune.
The tracking advocates argue that the Legislature's failure to mandate that the government track every citizen's prescription drug purchase and put them in a database is creating a growing heroin problem. Their logic: 75 percent of new heroin users first become hooked on prescription drugs. If Missouri could track every person's use of prescription narcotics, they argue we could dramatically reduce drug abuse.
Of course, in order to do so, the trackers first need to put the medical records of hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Missourians, into a government database. To protect others the trackers want to create a statewide dragnet. They seek to invade your privacy - even though you have done nothing wrong. Taking a legal prescription does not create any reasonable suspicion that you're a drug abuser, nor should it, the overwhelming majority of Missourians do not abuse prescription drugs.
Proponents seek to create enough momentum outside of session to create a "mission accomplished" feeling by the time session starts. They will not succeed.
Dragnets are wrong - even when proponents seek to create them for a just cause. Those opposing the government tracking program, myself and Rep. Keith Frederick (R-Rolla) included, will not go quietly next session if the tracking advocates try the same old thing. We will never go quietly. On the other side of the building, Sen. Rob Schaaf (R-St. Joseph) will have to be run over before a bill passes to create a dragnet.
But don't mistake opposition to a dragnet as opposition to everything. There is real room here for a creative compromise. Next session, I hope to help pass legislation that creates a drug abuser registry. Rather than putting every prescription drug purchase into the government system, the state would instead create a registry of Missourians who are known narcotics abusers. There could be four ways to be placed in the registry.
First, any person convicted of a drug crime or a crime in which a court finds that they were under the influence of drugs or influenced by drugs at the time it was committed would be placed on the registry. Second, any person involved in a civil lawsuit where drug abuse was an issue and they were found to be a drug abuser could be placed in the registry at the judge or administrative hearing officer's discretion. Third, a person could be placed on the registry after a hearing if they are reported through a sworn affidavit signed by a family or household member. (To guard against abuse, there must be serious consequences for false reports.) Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, a person could place themselves on the list.
The state could make this list accessible to health care providers writing and filling narcotic prescriptions. If a provider suspected a patient may be an abuser, they could type the suspected patient's name into the system, along with another personal identifier, and would be informed whether they were in the database. At that point, the provider could determine how to proceed, but would need to document any prescription authorized. (In no circumstance should the registry be available to law enforcement or any other person to use in a legal proceeding. It would be terrible policy to allow a person's decision to put their name in the registry to be used against them somewhere else.)
This type of system will identify those most likely to need help. Most people with serious drug problems make an effort at some point to get clean or have someone around them who tries to turn their life around. Many times they fail. That's the nature of addiction. They promise one afternoon to go to rehab, and then they conveniently disappear before everything is packed up and ready to go. With a registry in place, however, they have been flagged. The next time a provider suspects them of being an abuser, the provider will have a way to check.
This system is similar to Missouri's gambling addiction registry. As with prescription drugs, a small percentage of gamblers in Missouri are addicts who endanger their own and their families' financial future with their habits. Missouri has a Problem Gamblers' List that bans people who put their own names on the list from entering Missouri casinos - and it works well.
What would the public reaction be, however, if a group proposed creating a government database of every transaction that every visitor to a Missouri casino made? My bet is that you and just about everyone you know would be appalled. Why should innocent people have their legal activity tracked when they've done nothing wrong? And yet, the government tracking advocates propose the very same thing without batting an eye.
I refuse to believe that privacy is dead, and I'm confident we can pass legislation to fight prescription drug addiction without violating the privacy of millions of Missourians.
State Rep. Jay Barnes, R-Jefferson City, respresents Missouri's 60th District.