Two Democratic Vermont senators are putting together a proposal for a tax on prescription opioids. The proceeds would be used to bolster substance abuse intervention, treatment and recovery efforts, many of which are short-funded or are facing declines in current revenues.
Sen. Claire Ayer (D-Addison), chair of the Health and Welfare Committee, outlined the idea in a Friday morning committee hearing, which also featured testimony on how the proceeds of a tax might best be used.
Ayer said that she and Senate President Pro Tempore Tim Ashe (D/P-Chittenden) happened upon the idea in Governing magazine, which examined how states are trying to fund substance abuse programs. According to legislative fiscal analyst Nolan Langweil, several other states have considered an opiate tax, but none has enacted one.
The idea is still in development. Ayer and Ashe haven’t settled on a tax rate, or even on how it would be levied. Prescription opiates could be taxed per pill, per dosage, or per “morphine milligram equivalents,” a standard measure of a drug’s potency. The tax would likely not apply to prescriptions for chronic pain. Also unresolved is where the tax would be collected: from manufacturers, distributors, or at the point of sale.
Ayer fully realizes that the proposal flies in the face of Gov. Phil Scott’s opposition to new taxes or fees.
“He’s drawn a very hard line, and we have very hard surfaces,” she said. “We have very difficult situations to be addressed … He will have to make a decision whether [to approve] something that’s a reasonable way to fund the consequences of using opiates with a tax on opiates.”
Witnesses called before Ayer’s committee described a system that’s overburdened, underfunded and inadequate to provide a robust response to Vermont’s opioid epidemic. “In our treatment system, there are a lot of places in need and I’m not seeing solutions,” said Bob Bick, CEO of the Howard Center in Burlington. He said that Vermont has built “an important national model for intervention, but the financing of that model is at risk.”
As an example, he cited the state’s drug court programs, which are designed to decriminalize those with substance abuse problems — getting them into treatment instead of behind bars. “The programs are federally funded, and the money will run out in nine months,” he noted.
The tax idea is in its formative stages and an actual bill has yet to be written, but it appears to be on a fast track in the Senate. “We’ve already spoken with the chairs of the Appropriations and Finance committees,” said Ayer.
Indeed, Finance chair Ann Cummings (D-Washington) sits on the Health and Welfare Committee and said she has a mechanism in mind to speed the concept along. “I have a House bill that does talk about taxes,” she said, indicating that it was a relatively minor bill that’s been awaiting action since last year. That would allow the House and Senate to act on an opioids tax, even though it’s too late to introduce new legislation this session.
Gov. Phil Scott’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Disclosure: Tim Ashe is the domestic partner of Seven Days publisher and coeditor Paula Routly. Find our conflict-of-interest policy here: sevendaysvt.com/disclosure.
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Great idea. Let’s take the chronically ill, those that can’t work in many cases, and charge them extra money just so they aren’t in severe pain.
I cant take it anymore. I have an 81-year-old mother in law who lives in chronic pain and these Tax & Spend Liberals want to Tax her more.
I have 3 more years to get vested in my Healthcare and then I am moving back to America.
I honestly can’t take these people, they lay awake at night thinking up stuff to Tax, it’s unreal.
I used to Love this State.
A very stupid idea! Now those who have a real need for the meds will have to pay more to support those addicted. Par for the course for a legislator who doesn’t know what she doesn’t know!
Claire Ayer and Tim Ashe are just a waste of space working to make it more difficult for those of us in chronic pain.They are rotten, heartless people that are punishing a whole group of people who have done nothing wrong and are just trying to live their lives without being in constant debilitating pain. And all because of a bunch of addicts. No one ever gave either one of these fools any credit for brains but this is a new low, even for Ayer and Ashe.
Ya know you can’t fix stupid.. but they sure are in the state house. Seems to me that they are getting paid to just think up STUPID ideas ..They make $707.36/week (leg. session) $115/day for lodging (including overnight) or $74/day (no overnight). They also get $152 a week for gas, $61 a day for food. Remember David Zuckerman cheating on his claims??? Time to vote these fools out and put in sensible Vermonters…Need to stop doing what other states are doing…Oh NH legislators get $200 per 2 yr term ..
How about taxing idiotic legislators on their insufferable and egregious proposals. That would cover the costs of just about all Vermont government operations.
I agree that this tax is a bad idea, but if you’re going to criticize it, please get the details right. Per the article, “[t]he tax would likely not apply to prescriptions for chronic pain.” (Which is compassionate, but irrational — is there any evidence to suggest that prescriptions given for acute pain are _more_ likely to lead to addiction than those given for chronic pain??)
I have chronic pain. Because a selfish drunk driver running from the cops ran into me at a stop light. I didn’t ask for this. Nor was a given a choice do I want to live in pain everyday NO. And I bet any of these so called senators ever needed pain meds they wouldn’t be taxed or red flagged. What a absurd bill.. Why do I have to pay more. Because someone chooses to be a addict. Hell I have a life sentence of pain. While this drunk driver gets to live her life. 2 yrs and still haven’t been to court. Where are the laws against drunk drivers. Where are the bills to tax them more for killing people? No let’s punish the ones who truly need help. And reward the ones breaking the law.
More ignorance riding the heels of misinformation! How could the additional cost of opiod prescriptions on whether at the patient level or manufacturer level not effect the end cost which will be ultimately absorbed by the patient? Millions in the US suffer from severe chronic pain and the majority of them are the disabled and elderly….those least able to afford any more money for their medications. Also please explain how this could possibly not effect those with chronic pain? Secondly, this appears to be based on the idea that it the “opiod crisis” is about legitimate prescription medications taken by the person for whom they are prescribed so therefore genuine pain pain patients should foot the bill for addicts to be treated. (Otherwise, why are we not taxing chemotherapy or heart medicines to pay for addicts to be treated?) Recent in depth studies done in some of the nation’s large emergency rooms reveal that most deaths (80%) are in fact from illegal heroin and what they are often calling “prescription pain medicine” in statistics used by the CDC is actually illegal Fentanyl brought in from China and Mexico. Yes, Fentanyl is used in the treatment of chronic pain and anesthesia but not in the form which is being sold on the street and causing overdose deaths. It has nothing to do with patients who legitimately need these drugs and yet once again they are being victimized by those who should be protecting them.
Why do I constantly see pictures of Claire Ayre in almost every edition of Seven Days. I must say you have her pictured from every angle. Is this woman that important or does someone lurk that maybe is a secret admirer?
I must say she comes up with some of the nuttier tax schemes. I mean, “lets tax it so the people who really need it have to pay more”, is one of the most thought-less ideas I’ve heard.
More from Montpelier to take over my PCPs job and relegate her/him to merely a Probation Officer. Why can those fools not get that chronic pain patients are NOT the problem and ignorant legislators are not helping by instituting asinine laws which do nothing toward solving the opioid problem which is primarily ILLEGAL opioids !
I just want to make sure I understand this correctly. Tax those who use Opiate drugs in a responsible way to pay for those who don’t use Opiates in a responsible way. Is this correct?