FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:  Andrew Rosenberg (arosenberg@thornrun.com), (202) 247-6301
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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) should take immediate steps to curtail the practice of recommending lifetime use of addictive pain medications for individuals who set up Workers’ Compensation Medicare Set-Aside Arrangements (MSAs), according to a recent letter from the Medicare Advocacy Recovery Coalition (MARC). 
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Today, Medicare Advocacy Recovery Coalition (MARC) Chairman Greg McKenna submitted a comment letter to CMS Administrator Seema Verma in response to the proposed rule entitled ​"Medicare Program; Contract Year 2019 Policy and Technical Changes to the Medicare Advantage, Medicare Cost Plan, Medicare Fee-for-Service, the Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit Programs, and the PACE Program." In the letter, Chairman McKenna applauded CMS' ​initiatives to address the nation's opioid epidemic, and stressed that CMS must to ensure that frequently abused drugs are appropriately managed so that Medicare beneficiaries at risk of abuse and addiction cannot access them through the Part D program. "We write today to urge CMS in both its final rule and in the final rule preamble to address how frequently abused drugs could be accessed through Workers Compensation Medicare Set Aside arrangements (MSAs)," wrote Chairman McKenna.