HR-10649-119
Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.
Sponsored by Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR)
What it does
The bill would require the Attorney General to award grants to covered entities to establish or maintain disposal sites for unwanted prescription medications, with no more than 10 percent of each year's grant total going to state, local, or tribal law enforcement agencies and to drug manufacturers, distributors, or reverse distributors. It would impose a fee of 1 cent per 100 milligrams of active opioid sold by the manufacturer, producer, or importer, excluding drugs used exclusively for opioid addiction treatment. It would direct the Health and Human Services Secretary to set up a mechanism so patients treated for cancer-related pain, hospice patients, and their representatives or estates do not pay any amount attributable to the fee. Appropriations from fiscal year 2027 on would be authorized up to the fees collected.
Who benefits
Entities that would receive grants, such as pharmacies, hospitals, and other covered entities, to run take-back sites. Households and communities that would gain more places to discard unused opioids, which may reduce diversion and accidental exposure. Cancer-pain and hospice patients and their families, who would be shielded from the fee's cost. Patients in treatment for opioid addiction, whose medications are excluded from the fee.
Who is hurt
Opioid manufacturers, producers, and importers, who would owe the fee and bear the administrative work of calculating it. Patients prescribed opioids for other conditions, such as post-surgical or chronic non-cancer pain, who may pay higher prices if the fee is passed along. Insurers and pharmacies that may need to administer the discount mechanism. Law enforcement agencies and manufacturers or distributors that would face the 10 percent cap on grant shares. HHS, which would bear the cost of building the discount system.
Supporters argue
Supporters argue the bill ties the cost of disposal to the product that creates the risk, so the fee is tiny at 1 cent per 100 milligrams and the program needs no general taxpayer money. They contend that exemptions for cancer, hospice, and addiction-treatment patients protect people who most need these drugs, and that more disposal sites would reduce leftover pills that can be misused, since many people who misuse opioids report getting them from family or friends.
Opponents argue
Opponents argue the fee would be passed down to patients prescribed opioids for pain outside the exempted groups, and that the discount mechanism would add administrative burdens on pharmacies, insurers, and HHS. They contend that grant funding tied to a fee on a lawful medicine is an indirect way to raise revenue, that the 10 percent cap may limit useful partners, and that disposal sites alone may do little to reduce overdose deaths driven largely by illicit opioids.
Constitutional context
Congress's authority rests on the Taxing and Spending Clause (Art. I, §8, cl. 1) for the fee and grants, and the Commerce Clause for regulating the drug market. NFIB v. Sebelius (2012) confirmed that Congress may use its taxing power to impose a charge even where it regulates behavior, and a small excise fee on manufacturers is within that tradition. The Origination Clause may also be relevant because the bill raises revenue and originates in the House.
Checks and balances
The executive branch (the Attorney General, DEA, and HHS) gains authority to run grants and a discount mechanism, checked by Congress's appropriations power, which limits spending to fees collected, and by judicial review of agency implementation.
Historical precedent
The Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act of 2016, which this bill amends, already authorizes related disposal and take-back efforts, and the Secure and Responsible Drug Disposal Act of 2010 and the DEA's National Prescription Drug Take Back Day programs set earlier federal disposal frameworks.