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Maine had steepest decline in opioid sales last year, study says

The study credits the decline in sales to a 2016 law in Maine that put limits on opioid prescriptions - but recovery advocates say this victory may have unintended consequences.

(NEWS CENTER Maine) - Maine had the greatest decline of prescription opioid sales of any state in the country in 2017, according to a study by Avalere Health.

From 2016 to 2017, Maine had a 25 percent decline in the amount of opioids sold, a far steeper drop than the national average of 11 percent.

The study credits the drastic drop to a 2016 law setting limits on opioid prescriptions that went into full effect in 2017. This law was proposed by Governor Paul LePage and passed by the Legislature.

The 2016 law limiting opioid prescriptions raised concerns among some chronic pain sufferers in Maine, causing the language to be amended in 2017.

RELATED ► Chronic pain sufferers applaud changes to opioid limits law

Still, Avalere Health representatives say states with prescription limit laws had steeper declines in opioid sales than states without such laws.

"The over prescribing [was] one of the causal affects of the epidemic, but not the sole one," said Gordon Smith, the Executive Vice President of the Maine Medical Association. "And some medicine needed to clean up that piece, that's the piece that medicine owned. And this data shows that we are doing that very rapidly."

He says while the data is good news, there is still much to be done to combat the epidemic, particularly in the areas of treatment and prevention.

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