L.A. Now Live: Bills empower state against prescription drug abuse

Join us at 9 a.m. when we talk with Times reporter Scott Glover about three bills related to drug prescriptions awaiting Gov. Jerry Brown’s signature.

Last week, state lawmakers passed an ambitious slate of reforms aimed at giving authorities better tools and broader powers to crack down on doctors who recklessly prescribe narcotic painkillers and other commonly abused drugs.

The three bills, which garnered strong bipartisan support, await a signature from Brown that would make them law.

Brown, who as attorney general railed against prescription drug abuse and pill-pushing doctors, declined through a spokesman to say how he would respond to the bills.

The proposed legislation was spurred by a series of investigative reports in The Times that linked drugs prescribed by doctors to nearly half the prescription-involved overdose deaths in Southern California from 2006 through 2011.

The Times also revealed that state Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris was not using a state database to identify potentially problematic prescribers.

Following the series, the parents and loved ones of overdose victims held a rally in Sacramento calling for reforms that would help expose and stop doctors who cater to addicts. Lawmakers threatened to abolish the Medical Board of California if it didn’t become more proactive in dealing with the problem. The Times series prompted two proposed laws and created support for another that had twice failed in the Legislature.

One bill on Brown’s desk is a proposal to require coroners to report overdose deaths involving prescription drugs to the medical board. The board could then use those reports to link patient deaths to a doctor’s practice and determine whether reckless prescribing was a factor.

A second bill would bolster the state’s prescription drug monitoring program. The centerpiece of the program, known as CURES, is a database containing detailed information about narcotics dispensed by pharmacies in California, including the identities of the prescriber and the patient.

The third bill is designed to remove roadblocks that medical board officials say have hampered their ability to investigate physicians suspected of putting patients at risk. Doctors who fail to cooperate could face board sanctions.