Glenn group seeks drug
legislation
By LARRY MITCHELL-Staff Writer
Posted: 12/30/2010 12:00:00 AM PST
WILLOWS — A group called Not in Our Town — Glenn County seeks a lawmaker to carry legislation
aimed at reducing addiction to prescription drugs.
Jim Bettencourt, of Willows, who heads the group, said this week he is lining up meetings with state
and federal lawmakers to discuss the proposal.
His group proposes a bill that would require doctors to give patients a written test and a urine
test before prescribing any "scheduled" drug.
The distribution of such medicines is controlled because of their potential for abuse.
Doctors who specialize in pain-management routinely administer urine and written tests before
prescribing scheduled drugs, Bettencourt said, but the practice is rare among most doctors.
The written test is designed to reveal if a patient has a propensity to become addicted.
The urine test will tell if a patient has drugs in his or her system.
Not in Our Town — Glenn County sponsored a forum on the abuse of prescription drugs in
September at Chico State University.
Bettencourt said he plans to meet with U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein's health-legislation aide next week
to discuss the proposed measure.
He said he intends to meet with Congressman Wally Herger, R-Chico. And he hopes to talk to
Assemblyman Jim Nielsen, R-Gerber, and state Sen. Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, about the proposal, as
well.
"I don't care which branch or which agency promotes it as their own," he said.
"I want to see it move forward in one capacity or another."
One concern about the measure is cost, Bettencourt said, adding the written test has very little cost, and
the urine test isn't too expensive.
In the long run, the proposal would save money, he said.
"Think of the hundreds of thousands of individuals who would be prevented from becoming addicted or
having an overdose."
According to an article published in November in "Pediatrics," the official journal of the American
Academy of Pediatrics, "The non-medical use of prescription medications has increased by 162 percent in the past decade and has surpassed all illicit drugs except marijuana in the United States."
Bettencourt said young people aren't only getting controlled drugs from their parents' medicine chests or from their friends — many get their own prescriptions from doctors.
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