Pingree-backed bill to address problem of infants struggling with drug Withdrawal Passes U.S. House

Statement

A bill backed by Congresswoman Chellie Pingree that would begin to develop a national strategy for addressing the problem of babies who sufferdrug withdrawal symptoms as soon as they are born passed the U.S. House tonight. The number of infants who start life with drugs in their system is rising quickly in Maine, increasing by 500% between 2005 and 2012. In 2012, 779 babies were born in Maine who had to be weaned off some sort of opioid.

"It's hard to think of anything more tragic than the image of a newborn struggling with the symptoms of withdrawal. Sadly, as the number of adults addicted to drugs increase, so does the number of babies who start out life having to be weaned off drugs," Pingree said. "It's a big problem in Maine and around the country, and it's time we started to develop a national strategy to address it."

Pingree is a co-sponsor of the Protecting Our Infants Act of 2015 (H.R. 1462), which would require federal experts at agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services to develop a national strategy for tracking the number of cases and creating recommendations for prevention and treatment. The bill passed the House unanimously tonight.

"This is a really tragic problem and the first step is to get a better handle on how widespread it is and come up with the best ways to treat these infants in their first few years of life," Pingree said. "That's been lacking at the national level and this bill addresses the problem."

Source