Crib Act

Floor Speech

Ms. CLARK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, in my home State of Massachusetts, and in many other States across the country, we are battling a crisis that is blind to income, race, gender, and politics. That crisis is opiate addiction. It is happening at a deadly rate across the country, increasing by nearly 60 percent over the last decade.

Today, I want to focus on the youngest of those affected by this epidemic.

Every hour, a baby is born in the United States addicted to opiates. In Massachusetts, the number of babies born with this condition has risen to five times the national rate. In Kentucky, the rate has increased thirtyfold; in Ohio, sixfold; and in Colorado, as many as 6 percent of the babies born will experience these addiction symptoms.

Babies born with the condition known as Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome, or NAS, are born into the pain of opiate withdrawal, which adults report as the worst pain they have experienced in their lives. These babies may suffer from seizures, breathing problems, fevers, tremors, or difficulty feeding. These symptoms can last for months and lead to weeks of hospitalization. One boy suffering from NAS in my district experienced such severe seizures that he suffered a detached retina.

In an urgent response to the surge of NAS diagnoses, hospitals across the country have begun piecing together the best methods to diagnose and treat NAS. But incomplete and uncoordinated data collection hampers a State's ability to identify the scope of the problem and apply solutions and treatment effectively.

I am asking my colleagues to join me in taking a critically important first step in caring for these newborns by supporting the Coordinated Recovery Initiative for Babies Act, known as the CRIB Act.

I have partnered with my good colleague from Ohio (Mr. Stivers) to introduce this bipartisan legislation.

The CRIB Act is the first proposed bill to take proactive steps to help hospitals diagnose and treat newborns suffering from opiate dependency. It will give the Department of Health and Human Services 1 year to collect the data necessary to assemble a portfolio of the best practices.

The final product will be based on the most successful models in the country and will be accessible to every State and the medical community. In addition to being the right thing to do for newborns, this bill will save us money.

NAS births are five times more expensive than healthy births, and Medicaid has been paying for 75 percent of these costs. This bill will help us identify the best ways to diagnose and treat these newborns, and it provides an important tool for addressing the opiate epidemic.

I urge my colleagues to join national medical groups, such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and support the CRIB Act.

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