Affordable Tutoring of Our Children Act

Mr. President, today I join Representative Susan Davis in commemorating Cesar E. Chavez's 82nd birthday by introducing legislation to name a post office in San Diego, CA, after this extraordinary civil rights activist and union leader.

Today we join millions of people across this Nation in honoring Cesar Chavez's legacy as an educator, environmentalist, and a civil rights leader who was committed to providing fair wages, better working conditions, decent housing, and quality education for all. As an activist, Chavez worked to give a voice to the voiceless, and inspire millions of Americans to stand up and say, ``Si, Se Puede!''

As a migrant farm worker in his youth, Cesar E. Chavez learned about the struggles of farm workers including poor wages, poor medical coverage, and poor working conditions. When he returned from serving his country in the Navy during World War II, Chavez began to work to improve this situation, first by organizing for the Community Service Organization coordinating voter-registration drives and battling racial and economic discrimination.

In 1962 Cesar Chavez founded the National Farm Workers Association, later to become the United Farm Workers, the largest farm workers union in the country. Using nonviolent tactics, such as boycotts, pickets, and strikes, Chavez raised awareness about the plight of farm workers. Cesar Chavez's unflagging determination made great strides in championing the rights of farm workers, but the struggle for farm workers continues. This year, thousands of workers across California are preparing to march, and continue the fight for their rights.

Cesar Chavez's life and legacy should serve not only as an example but an inspiration to us all as we work to address the growing inequality in our nation, as well as the challenges faced by America's working families, including poverty, health care, and education.

Fifteen years ago, President Clinton awarded Cesar Chavez the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in recognition of his great contributions to our Nation. Today we remember his work not only for the U.S., but also for the communities and people of the State of California.

San Diego is a city with a rich cultural heritage, and a history of community organizing and activism that shares its roots with Cesar Chavez's lifelong struggle for justice and equality. Cesar Chavez accomplished a great deal to improve living and working conditions for all people, and I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting this bill to recognize his work and his memory.

Mr. President, the need for health care reform is undeniable and we must undertake comprehensive efforts to provide quality care for our Nation's diverse populations, particularly older Americans. Our aging population is expected to almost double in number, from 37 million people today to about 72 million by 2030. If we fail to prepare, our Nation will face a crisis in providing care to these older Americans. We must start now if we are going to adequately train the health care workforce to meet the needs of an aging America.

Health care providers with the necessary training to give older Americans the best care are in critically short supply. In its landmark report, Retooling for an Aging America, the Institute of Medicine concluded that action must be taken immediately to address the severe workforce shortages in the care of older adults.

According to the Institute of Medicine, only about 7,100 U.S. physicians are certified geriatricians today; 36,000 are needed by 2030. Just 4 percent of social workers and only 3 percent of advance practice nurses specialize in geriatrics. Recruitment and retention of direct care workers is also a looming crisis due to low wages and few benefits, lack of career advancement, and inadequate training.

Preparing our workforce for the job of caring for older Americans is an essential part of ensuring the future health of our nation. Right now, there is a critical shortage of health care providers with the necessary training and skills to provide our seniors with the best possible care. This is a tremendously important issue for American families who are concerned about quality of care and quality of life for their older relatives and friends.

It is clear that there is a need for federal action to address these issues, and that is why Senator Collins and I are introducing the Caring for an Aging America Act. This legislation would help attract and retain trained health care professionals and direct care workers dedicated to providing quality care to the growing population of older Americans by providing them with meaningful loan forgiveness and career advancement opportunities.

Specifically, for health professionals who complete specialty training in geriatrics or gerontology--including physicians, physician assistants, advance practice nurses, social workers, pharmacists and psychologists--the legislation would link educational loan repayment to a service commitment to the aging population, modeled after the successful National Health Services Corps. The bill would also expand loan repayment for registered nurses who complete specialty training in geriatric care and who choose to work in long-term care settings, and expand career advancement opportunities for direct care workers by offering specialty training in long-term care services. Lastly, the legislation would establish a health and long-term care workforce advisory panel for an aging America.

In addition, I was pleased to work with the Alzheimer's Association and the American Geriatrics Society to ensure that this legislation will also help provide a workforce to meet the needs of older Americans with dementia, Alzheimer's and other cognitive disorders.

Ensuring we have a well-trained health care workforce with the skills to care for our aging population is a critical investment in America's future. This legislation offers a modest but important step toward creating the future health care workforce that our Nation so urgently needs.

I look forward to working with Senator Collins and our colleagues to ensure that we meet our obligations to the seniors of our Nation to improve their care.

Mr. President, as we engage in the debate on health care reform, it is critical that we address the need to invest in health research and innovation to spur the development of new treatments and cures for diseases. Today, I am proud to introduce two bills, S. 755 and S. 756, that would direct Federal investment in new programs that would develop tools to detect ovarian and prostate cancers.

We know that early and reliable detection of these cancers can save lives. These bills make sure we have the tools we need to catch these cancers early, when they can be treated thereby significantly increasing survival rates.

First, the Ovarian Cancer Biomarker Research Act provides funding for research directed toward the development of reliable screening techniques for ovarian cancer--a critical investment in the future of any woman who will face ovarian cancer.

Though only one in 72 women will face ovarian cancer in their lifetime, this disease ranks fifth in cancer deaths among women and causes more deaths than any other cancer of the female reproductive system. In the last year alone, the National Cancer Institute, NCI, estimated there were 15,520 deaths from ovarian cancer in the U.S.

For many years, ovarian cancer has been called the ``silent killer'' because too often women are diagnosed with this disease too late to be saved. But when ovan cancer is diagnosed early, more than 93 percent of women survive longer than 5 years. Because there is currently no effective screening test available, 4 out of 5 ovarian cancer cases in the U.S. are diagnosed in the later stages, when a woman's chance of surviving more than 5 years drops to 46 percent.

The Ovarian Cancer Biomarker Research Act would authorize NCI to make grants for public or nonprofit entities to establish research centers focused on ovarian cancer biomarkers. Biomarkers are biochemical features within the body that can be used to measure the progress of a disease and predict the effects of treatment. This legislation also authorizes funding for a national clinical trial that will enroll at- risk women in a study to determine the clinical utility of using these validated ovarian cancer biomarkers.

The Society of Gynecologic Oncologists, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the Ovarian Cancer National Alliance, and the American College of Surgeons have all joined together in support of this research developing tools to detect ovarian cancer early, because they know it is critical to improving the rate of survival for women struck by this disease.

The second bill, the Prostate Imaging, Research and Men's Education Act, addresses the urgent need for the development of new technologies to detect and diagnose prostate cancer.

Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer in the U.S., and the second leading cause of cancer related deaths in men--striking 1 in every 6 men. In 2008, it was estimated that more than 186,000 men were diagnosed with prostate cancer, and more than 28,000 men died from the disease.

The Prostate Research, Imaging, and Men's Education Act, or PRIME Act, would mirror the investment the Federal Government made in advanced imaging technologies, which led to life-saving breakthroughs in detection, diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer. This bill directs the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to expand prostate cancer research, and provides the resources to develop innovative advanced imaging technologies for prostate cancer detection, diagnosis, and treatment.

In addition, the PRIME Act would create a national campaign to increase awareness about the need for prostate cancer screening, and works with the Offices of Minority Health at HHS and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to ensure that this information reaches the men most at risk from this disease.

The PRIME Act will also promote research that improves prostate cancer screening blood tests. According to a National Cancer Institute study, current blood tests result in false-negative reassurances and numerous false-positive alarms. Some 15 percent of men with normal blood test levels actually have prostate cancer. Even when levels are abnormal, some 88 percent of men end up not having prostate cancer but undergo unnecessary biopsies. Furthermore, the prostate is one of the last organs in a human body where biopsies are performed blindly, which can miss cancer even when multiple samples are taken.

Government initiatives in research and education can be the key to diagnosing prostate or ovarian cancers earlier and more accurately. These two bills would strengthen our efforts to fight these diseases.

These bills are of vital importance to thousands of men and women across our great Nation, and the families and friends who are concerned for their continued health. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the House and Senate to get these bills passed as soon as possible.

Mr. President, today I am introducing the Charlie Wolf Nuclear Workers Compensation Act. It is a bill designed to improve a program to compensate Americans who are gravely ill because they were exposed to radiation or other toxins while working in our Cold War-era nuclear weapons complex.

This is an issue that is important to many Coloradans because of the work done at Rocky Flats outside of Denver. The compensation program has a number of serious flaws, and I have worked on solutions for several years now.

The bill I am introducing includes a number of provisions that I introduced last session in the House of Representatives with my Colorado colleague, Representative Ed Perlmutter. This year, I expanded on those provisions and added others to help these workers finally get the assistance they deserve under this program.

We named the bill for Charlie Wolf, who was one of thousands of workers during the Cold War era, who risked their health in order to build America's nuclear arsenal. And I believe his story illustrates why we should do better by these workers--and why I have introduced this bill.

Charlie worked as an engineer at Rocky Flats--and before that, at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. He--and the thousands of other workers like him--are Cold War veterans. As controversial as their work often was, they were also patriotic Americans who did more for our country than collect a paycheck.

They believed that their work was keeping the world safe from the Soviet threat--and keeping this country strong. And they were right.

But their work was also dangerous. As a result of radiation and toxins he was exposed to on the job, Charlie developed brain cancer a little over 6 years ago. He was given 6 months to live--but he hung on for 6 years.

During all of those 6 years, he and his family fought with the Federal government to get the compensation that he was promised--and that he deserved.

Charlie's struggles were documented by the Rocky Mountain News in a series of stories called ``Deadly Denial.'' That title, unfortunately, has come to symbolize the troubles with this compensation program.

I have heard from many former workers, who--like Charlie and his family--have been subjected to repeated delays, lost records, complex exposure formulas, and other roadblocks.

We simply cannot--and should not--subject these workers--patriotic people who put themselves in harm's way to help secure our nation-- through these kinds of obstacles and difficulties.

It is shameful and, frankly, enough is enough.

This Congress recognized that we should compensate our Cold Warriors and certain survivors who put their health and life on the line to serve our Nation during the Cold War. We created the EEOICPA program to carry out that compensation.

I was among those who strongly supported the EEOICPA provisions that were finally enacted into law in 2000.

But the next year brought a new administration that, regrettably, did not advocate for the program as the Clinton administration had.

Simply put, the program is not working the way it was intended.

As a result, while many people have received benefits under the program, too many face inexcusable obstacles as they try--often in old age or while struggling with the effects of cancer or other serious illnesses--to prove they qualify for benefits.

More than 9 years after we enacted EEOICPA, workers have died without receiving the health care or compensation they deserve.

In fact, a combination of missing records and bureaucratic red tape has prevented many workers from accessing any compensation for their serious illnesses.

I now look forward to working with the Obama administration to correct problems with this compensation program.

The bill I am introducing this week is part of that ongoing effort.

The Charlie Wolf Act is designed to expand the category of individuals eligible for compensation, improve the procedures for providing compensation and transparency, and grant the Office of the Ombudsman greater authority to help workers.

I would like to explain a couple of the provisions in a little more detail.

First, it would revise the part of the EEOICPA law that specifies which covered workers are part of what is known as a ``special exposure cohort'' designation under the law.

The revision would extend this ``special exposure cohort'' status to Department of Energy employees, Department of Energy contractor employees,

or atomic weapons employees who worked at a nuclear weapons facility prior to January 1, 2006.

Being included in a special exposure cohort would help make it easier for workers to establish that their radiation-linked cancer was the result of working at one of these facilities.

Second, the bill would change the burden of proving that a radiation- linked cancer was the result of workplace exposure to toxic materials.

As the law now stands, before a worker can receive benefits, they must establish that the cancer is as likely as not to have resulted from on-the-job exposure to radiation.

While that sounds like a reasonable requirement, many workers have learned that we have not adequately documented radiation exposures over the years.

In fact, there were serious shortcomings in the monitoring of nuclear weapons plant workers' radiation exposures and in the necessary recordkeeping. Also, the current administrative process for determining links between exposure and employment is terribly slow.

Many worker exposures were unmonitored or under-monitored over a nuclear weapons plant's history. As such, the current law requires these workers to seek ``dose reconstructions''--essentially using some extrapolated data modeling to re-create the sorts of exposures experienced.

But ``dose reconstructions'' are extremely difficult, slow and arduous for the worker and the agency. The process drags out, while workers like Charlie suffer and wait for compensation they need--in some cases, to help them pay for cancer treatments or care for other deadly illnesses.

This is wrong. We owe these workers better than that.

My bill fixes that problem by presuming that a worker with a covered radiation-linked cancer is eligible for compensation. And it puts the burden of proof on the agency.

So, unless the agency can show--by clear and convincing evidence-- that their cancer was not caused by exposure while working at a nuclear weapons facility, that worker would be eligible for compensation.

It may seem like this is asking to prove a negative, but I believe that it requires the federal agency to prove that the cancer may have been the result of other factors. I think it is more appropriate to place this burden on the federal government--and not the ill worker.

Third, the bill expands the list of cancers for which individuals are eligible to receive compensation. The current law fails to recognize some cancers that could legitimately be caused by exposure to toxic materials at these sites.

The bill also requires the Department of Labor to pay a claimant's estate should a claimant die after filing their claim--but before receiving payment and leaving no survivors.

Finally, the bill makes a number of other changes that are all designed to make this process more user-friendly and helpful to claimants.

It expands the duties of the Ombudsman's Office, providing greater transparency and communication with claimants, and allowing more time to file legal actions should claims be denied.

It also allows claimants who were previously denied to re-file their claims.

Since early in my tenure in Congress, I have worked to make good on promises of a fairer deal for the nuclear-weapons workers who helped America win the Cold War.

That was why enactment and improvement of the compensation act has been one of my top priorities. This is an important matter for our country. It is literally a life-or-death issue for the Coloradans who are sick today because of their work at Rocky Flats.

The Charlie Wolf Act will not remedy all the shortcomings of the current law, but it will make it better.

I hope to work with my colleagues in the Senate, who have constituents who face situations similar to that of Charlie and his family. I hope for swift action from both Congress and the administration to keep our promises to these workers and their families.

Charlie Wolf and his family deserve better, as do all of the Americans who have made similar scarifies and been subjected to similar struggles.

Charlie's widow, Kathy, told me this week that Charlie carried on his fight out of principle because he didn't want other workers to have to fight the country they worked so hard to protect.

I am proud to continue to work on behalf of Charlie's family and his memory. I urge my colleagues to cosponsor or support this worthwhile legislation and honor our Cold War heroes.

I would like to thank Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado and Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico for joining me as original cosponsors of this bill.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today, I am introducing the Teaching Geography is Fundamental Act. I am pleased to be joined by my friend from Connecticut, Mr. Dodd. The purpose of this bill is to improve geographic literacy among K-12 students in the U.S. by supporting professional development programs for their teachers that are administered in institutions of higher education and other educational institutions. This bill also assists States in measuring the impact of education in geography.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said, ``To solve most of the major problems facing our county today--from wiping out terrorism, to minimizing global environmental problems, to eliminating the scourge of AIDS--will require every young person to learn more about other regions, cultures, and languages.'' We need to do more to ensure that the teachers responsible for the education of our students, from kindergarten through high school graduation, are prepared and trained to teach these critical skills to solve these problems. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act has expressly identified geography as a core academic subject. Yet, when we review No Child Left Behind, geography education is the only subject without a dedicated source of support for educational training and innovation.

This bill prepares students to be good citizens of both our nation and the world. John Fahey, President of the National Geographic Society, stated that ``geographic illiteracy impacts our economic well- being, our relationships with other nations and the environment, and isolates us from the world.'' When students understand their own environment, they can better understand the differences in other places, and the people who live in them. Knowledge of the diverse cultures, environments, and the relationships between states and countries helps our students to understand national and international policies, economies, societies, and political structures on a more global scale.

To expect that Americans will be able to work successfully with the other people in this world, we need to be able to communicate and understand each other. We need to prepare our younger generation for global competition and ensure that they have a strong base of understanding to be able to succeed in the global marketplace.

The 2005 publication, What Works in Geography, reported that elementary school geography instruction significantly improves student achievement and proved that the integration of geography into the elementary school curriculum improves student literacy achievement an average of 5 percent. That is the good news. However, the 2006 National Geographic-Roper Global Geographic Literacy Survey shows that 69 percent of elementary school principals report a decrease in the time spent teaching geography, and less than a quarter of our nation's high school students take a geography course in high school. This survey shows that many of our high school graduates lack the basic skills needed to navigate our international economy, policies, and relationships. According to statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, 30 percent of the annual U.S. GDP, that is 4.3 trillion dollars, results from international trade. According to the CIA World Factbook of 2005, U.S. workers need geographic knowledge to compete in this global economy. Geographic knowledge is increasingly needed for U.S. businesses in international markets to understand such factors as physical distance, time zones, language differences, and cultural diversity among project teams.

In addition, geospatial technology is an emerging and innovative career available to people with strong geography education. Professionals in geospatial technology are employed in Federal Government agencies, the private sector, and the non-profit sector. These professionals focus on areas such as agriculture, archeology, ecology, land appraisal, and urban planning and development. According to the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, the information gathering necessary to protect critical infrastructure has resulted in an enormous increase in the demand for geospatial skills and jobs. A strong geography education system is a necessity for this industry's continued advancement. The U.S. Department of Labor has identified geospatial technologies as one of the most important high-growth industries, with the market growing at an annual rate of 35 percent. These are high-tech, high-wage jobs in which America can and must compete.

It has been both the private and non-profit sectors working to ensure that the critical skills and knowledge provided by geography education are provided to our schools. Over the last 20 years, the National Geographic Society has awarded more than $100 million in grants to educators, universities, State geographic alliances, and others for the purposes of advancing and improving the teaching of geography. Their models are successful, and research shows that students who have benefitted from this teaching out-perform other students. In all 50 States, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, there are state geographic alliances and partnerships between higher education and K-12 school systems. Thirty States, including Mississippi and the District of Columbia, are endowed by grants from the National Geographic Society. But these efforts alone are not enough. The bill I am introducing establishes a Federal commitment to enhance the education of our teachers, focuses on geography education research, and develops reliable, advanced technology-based classroom resources. A 5 year, $15,000,000 grant program would be created under the bill to achieve these objectives.

In my State of Mississippi, teachers and university professors are making progress to increase geography education in the schools through additional professional training. To date, there are 555 members of the Mississippi Geographic Alliance who teach geography. Last year, the Mississippi Geographic Alliance conducted a statewide workshop titled Introductory World Geography to help prepare teachers to meet the State's new graduation requirement in geography. The Alliance conducted two, week-long residential summer institutes that provided grade- specific geography content and teaching strategies; provided a field- based local Mississippi geography workshop; and conducted two workshops that introduce pre-service teachers to the scope of modern geography and effective geography teaching strategies.

I hope the Senate will consider the serious need to invest in geography, and I invite other Senators to cosponsor the Teaching Geography is Fundamental Act.

Mr. President, we are facing the worst economic crisis since the great depression. Health care costs are exploding. Our education system is in desperate need of reform. All while we continue to fight two wars on the other side of the globe.

At a time like this, our Nation's leaders need to be singularly focused on the challenges at hand. Yet as Senators and Congressmen we find ourselves spending more and more of our time raising money for our own re-elections. That means we spend less and less time focusing on our Nation's policy challenges.

In the last three election cycles, Senate candidates spent nearly $1.3 billion on their races. This is simply unsustainable.

Unless you have enough personal wealth to pay for a campaign by yourself, you have little choice but to spend an enormous amount of your time dialing for dollars to keep up with your competitors. If you do not attend the nightly fundraisers and hit the phones during power hours, your campaign message will be drowned out by your opponent's advertising by Election Day. You will stand little chance of being chosen to continue to work on the challenges you came to Washington to solve.

Worse, the system we currently use to finance Federal campaigns makes candidates far too reliant on the ability of wealthy donors to help raise the mountains of money necessary to compete.

The result is a public who rightly questions whether those that win elections in this system are serving ALL of their constituents and not just their wealthy donors.

We need to finance Federal campaigns differently. There has never been a more critical time for change.

That is why today I am reintroducing the bipartisan Fair Elections Now Act with my friend Senator Specter. I am pleased that Congressman Larson is introducing the companion legislation

in the House with Republican Congressmen Todd Platts of Pennsylvania and Walter Jones of North Carolina.

The Fair Elections Now Act would help restore public confidence in the Congressional election process by providing qualified candidates for Congress with grants, matching funds, and vouchers from the Fair Elections Fund to replace campaign fundraising that largely relies on lobbyists and other special interests. In return, participating candidates would agree to limit their campaign spending to the amounts raised from small-dollar donors plus the amounts provided from the Fund.

Fair Elections for the Senate would have three stages.

To participate, candidates would first need to prove their viability by raising a minimum number and amount of small-dollar qualifying contributions from in-state donors. Once a candidate qualifies, that candidate must limit the amount raised from each donor to $100 per election.

For the primary, participants would receive a base grant that would vary in amount based on the population of the state that the candidate seeks to represent. Participants would also receive a 4-to-1 match for small-dollar donations up to a defined matching cap. The candidate could raise an unlimited amount of $100 contributions if needed to compete against high-spending opponents.

For the general election, qualified candidates would receive an additional grant, further small-dollar matching, and vouchers for purchasing television advertising. The candidate could continue to raise an unlimited amount of $100 contributions if needed.

Under our plan, candidates will no longer be in the fundraising business. Instead, candidates will be in the constituent business, regardless of whether those constituents have the wealth to attend a fundraiser or to donate more than $100 per election. Candidates will be in the policy business, regardless of what policies are preferred by wealthy donors.

This is no naive theory. It is a system that is already at work. Very similar programs exist in Maine, Arizona, and elsewhere. These programs are bringing new faces and ideas into politics and making more races more competitive. Most importantly, candidates spend more time with constituents and in policy debates and less time with wealthy donors.

I know that some will say that the answer to this problem of time constraints is simply to remove individual contribution limits, so that with a few phone calls to billionaire donors candidates can raise all of the money that they need. I completely disagree. The answer is not to further concentrate influence in the hands of a smaller and smaller group of donors, but rather to remove that source of influence altogether. That is the only way to rebuild the trust of the American people.

Let me be clear: I honestly believe that the overwhelming majority of the people serving in American politics are good, honest people, and I believe that Senators and Congressmen are guided by the best of intentions. But we are nonetheless stuck in a terrible, corrupting system. The perception is that politicians are corrupted by the big money interests . . . and whether that is true or not, that perception and the loss of trust that goes with it makes it incredibly difficult for the Senate to take on tough challenges and have the American public believe that what we are doing is right.

I believe that this problem is fundamental to our democracy, and we must address it. Overwhelming numbers of Americans agree. Recent polling shows that 69 percent of Democrats, 72 percent Republicans, and 60 percent of independents supported a general description of this proposal. The Fair Elections Now Act is supported by several good Government groups, former members of Congress, business leaders, and even lobbyists.

Our Nation's leaders need to be completely focused on getting America back on track. The Fair Elections Now Act will help.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise today with my colleagues, Senator Corker and Senator Kennedy, to introduce the Methadone Treatment and Protection Act, legislation that provides a comprehensive solution to our country's growing problem of methadone-related deaths. In recent years, too many families have come to me with heartbreaking stories of mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers who have been seriously injured or who have died as a result of methadone. My State of West Virginia has been particularly hard-hit by the number of lives lost, with just seven methadone-related deaths in 1999 compared to approximately 120 deaths in 2005. In the face of such stark realities, we can no longer stand by and remain content with the status quo. Now is the time for a comprehensive strategy to address the misuse of methadone and prevent any additional avoidable deaths.

Methadone is an FDA approved, synthetic opioid prescription drug that has been extensively tested and used in the U.S. for more than thirty years. While it was first prescribed for pain management, methadone is also widely used as a part of opioid addiction treatment. The high efficacy and low cost of methadone has resulted in a significant rise in the number of methadone prescriptions, up 700 percent since 1998. However, there has also been a steep increase in the number of methadone-related deaths. In 2005, there were 4,462 methadone deaths, representing a 468 percent increase in the number of deaths since 1999.

Currently, oversight of methadone is fragmented between three federal agencies: the Food and Drug Administration, FDA, the Substances Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, SAMHSA, and the Drug Enforcement Administration, DEA. Currently, these agencies lack the most effective tools necessary to properly monitor methadone usage and effectively prevent methadone-related deaths. The legislation we are introducing today will address this shortcoming in our public health infrastructure by providing the administrative direction, funding, education, and data necessary to effectively monitor for the potential misuse of methadone.

The alarming number of accidental methadone-related overdoses indicates that both patients and practitioners do not fully understand the complex nature of this medication. Therefore, the Methadone Treatment and Protection Act will significantly improve patient and provider information about methadone by mandating the creation of a consumer education campaign and requiring additional training for practitioners who prescribe methadone and other opioids.

The bill will also improve Federal oversight of methadone by creating the Controlled Substances Clinical Standards Commission--with membership comprised of the FDA, SAMHSA, and the National Institutes of Health, NIH. This new Commission will establish safe dosage levels for methadone and other opioids, determine appropriate conversion factors when transferring a patient from one opioid to another, and create specific guidelines for initiating pain management treatment with methadone. To curtail the problems of doctor shopping and diversion, this legislation also adequately funds the National All Schedules Prescription Drug Reporting Act, NASPER. Passed and signed into law in 2005, NASPER requires providers to submit prescribing information for all schedule II, III, and IV drugs to State run controlled substance monitoring programs. NASPER also requires States to share this information with one another. Funding NASPER will serve as a deterrent to those who misuse methadone from crossing State lines in order to avoid being detected.

Finally, to improve access to comprehensive data on methadone-related deaths, this legislation mandates the completion of a standard Model Opioid Treatment Program Mortality Report, and requires its submission to a newly created National Opioid Death Registry. Prior to 1999, methadone did not have separate classification from other opiate- related deaths. Therefore, a study released by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2006 was the first opportunity to examine the trends in methadone exclusively. By creating a National Opioid Death Registry, it will be possible to more carefully track--and hopefully prevent--methadone-related deaths.

It is my belief that the multi-pronged approach provided in the Methadone Treatment and Protection Act will lead to a decrease in the number of opioid and methadone-related deaths. This legislation will improve the coordination of resources and information at the local, State and Federal level to stifle the rising death toll, while at the same time make certain methadone and other opioids remain accessible for those who truly need these medications. In light of the facts and the preventable nature of methadone-related deaths, Congress has a responsibility to the American people to guarantee individuals have access to the treatment they need in a manner that is both safe and effective. The time for action is now, and I urge my colleagues to join us in support of this important bill.