In a blow to New York’s efforts to fund expanded opioid addiction treatment and education, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York has declared the state’s new Opioid Stewardship Act unconstitutional. Healthcare Distribution Alliance v. Zucker et al., 16 Civ. 6168 (KPF) U.S. Dist. Ct. SDNY, Dec. 19, 2018. The court did so using the so-called Dormant Commerce Clause (also known as the Negative Commerce Clause), a legal doctrine inferred from the Constitution’s Commerce Clause by the Supreme Court. In essence, the Dormant Commerce Clause prohibits state and local laws from discriminating against interstate commerce, or favoring in-state commerce over out-of-state commerce.

Background

According to the federal Centers for Disease Control, 70,237 drug overdose deaths occurred in the United States in 2017, and New York was one of 23 states with statistically significant increases in drug overdose deaths from 2016-2017. In his 2018 State of the State address, Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared that addressing the opioid addiction crisis would be a priority, and in his proposed budget he included an opioid surcharge to be paid by opioid manufacturers, which would be used to offset the State’s costs of treating and preventing opioid abuse. The Opioid Stewardship Act (OSA) was passed by the Legislature, and the Governor signed it into law on April 12, 2018. 2018 N.Y. Session Laws 57, S. 7507-C, codified at NY Public Health Law (PHL) §3323 and NY State Finance Law §97-aaaa.

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