Blumenthal Condemns Republican Efforts to Defund Opioid Treatment Programs

[WASHINGTON, DC] – Today U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) joined U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee, U.S. Senator Edward J. Markey (D-MA) and U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH) to denounce Republican attempts to dramatically cut funding for Medicaid, which would have a disastrous impact on the opioid crisis. The Republican healthcare plan – being crafted behind closed doors – could strip fourteen million Americans covered under the ACA’s Medicaid expansion of access to life-saving opioid treatment and addiction programs.

“There’s no state that has been immune, no community that has not seen these deaths and tragedies. The Republicans say ‘Trust us. We have a secret bill. We have alternative funds. Trust us to do the right thing.’ That’s no way to address a national crisis, an epidemic that is truly a public health crisis,” Blumenthal said. “There is strong bipartisan support for effective action here, and the Republicans simply need to have the will to address this problem without gutting Medicaid. There’s no way that these alternative funds could ever adequately replace comprehensive insurance coverage or the progress that we’ve made in substance abuse treatment under Medicaid expansion. That is the simple truth.”

Trumpcare’s hundreds of billions in cuts to Medicaid would dramatically reduce the ability of state and local governments and healthcare providers to combat the ongoing opioid epidemic. The combination of unprecedented cuts to Medicaid, which pays for 25 percent of all annual drug treatment spending in the United States, and the end of mandatory coverage for substance use disorder treatment as an essential health benefit would severely limit drug treatment for many individuals, and drastically weaken the ability of communities to fight back against the opioid crisis.

Senate Democrats are speaking out in response to reports that Senate Republicans are considering cuts to Medicaid at similar levels to the House version of Trumpcare, but adding a grant funding program to provide opioid treatment. This approach would fall far short of helping the million Americans with a substance use disorder who would lose some or all of their health coverage if the ACA were repealed.

Video of Blumenthal’s full remarks is available here.