SB345 Prescription Drug Monitoring Program
SB 345, An Act To Establish A Prescription Drug Monitoring Program And For Other Purposes.
We read Meredith Oakley’s Voices page article on SB 345 this morning with horror!!! Imagine! This bill authorizes the Department of Health to establish and operate a prescription drug monitoring database on everyone in Arkansas! The bill requires pharmacists to report to the Arkansas Department of Health the particulars about certain drugs prescribed to Arkansans “without limitation.” The particulars would include a patient’s name, address, date of birth, prescription history and method of payment. As Oakley’s article states, “without limitation” language suggests that checking account and credit card numbers could be obtained.
We ask you, why is it that the state of Arkansas wishes to capture such information? What business is it of theirs to know what all prescriptions Arkansans are taking? This is an intrusion and clear violation of our rights to privacy. We implore each of you to go to the sight below and read this bill yourself. We beg you to take the time to call your legislators and tell them this is overstepping their boundaries into our personal lives! We CANNOT let this get passed into law and it is on the “fast track” as it has been passed in the Senate and is already in the House. Please, please if you have never called a legislator before, please do so TODAY because Monday could be too late. Folks, this is really, really a serious infringement of our privacy and who at ADH will be viewing this data? What will it be used for and when? Will employment decisions be made using this information? Once the approval for capturing the information is done, I promise you the net will broadened and other data will be recorded, too “just for statistical purposes” we will be told. Also there will be a lot of folks at ADH looking at your personal prescription information that you would not want to have access to that information. Why would our legislators not spend their time and our resources (as it is our tax dollars that fund their craziness) on illegal drug operations? There is absolutely no need for this data to be captured.
Please begin calling as soon as you read this. We must demand more of our senators and representatives than they have been able to show us this session!!! The legislators must have a conscience and not pass this dangerous bill!
Please call the House switchboard Monday morning, 501-682-6211, and leave a message for your representative.
If you want us to become a police state, just sit there and do nothing!!!
READ THE BILL
Link to SB345
Link to SB345′s Bill Status History
CALL YOUR LEGISLATOR
Link to the Arkansas State Legislature
Public Health, Welfare and Labor Committee – Senate
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