Bipartisan Bill to Create Remote Opioid Treatment Pilot Program Receives Sponsor Testimony

COLUMBUS – State Reps. Rachel Baker (D-Cincinnati) and Sharon Ray (R-Wadsworth) this week gave sponsor testimony before the Ohio House Behavioral Health Committee on House Bill (HB) 300, bipartisan legislation that creates a pilot program for remote treatment of opioid use disorder. 

“Our state is struggling with staggering rates of opioid addiction, overdoses, and related fatalities,” said Rep. Baker. “We must confront this ongoing public health crisis by using the best available resources and eliminating barriers to seeking treatment, and the ability of take-home doses reduces a lot of the barriers that tend to cause patients to fall out of treatment.”

This legislation would:

• Establish a pilot program through the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services to provide grant funding for the provision of remote medically assisted treatment to individuals with opioid use disorder through licensed opioid treatment programs.
• Appropriate $750,000 in FY24 and FY25 to the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services to be used to operate the program.

HB 300 now awaits further hearings in the House Behavioral Health Committee.