The Obama administration does not approve of a law making it a crime to use drugs while pregnant
It is now a crime to use drugs if you are pregnant in Tennessee.
A law signed by Republican Gov. Bill Haslam in April explicitly criminalizing drug abuse while pregnant is the first of its kind in the nation. It was spurred by the skyrocketing number of babies born to women who are abusing heroin or powerful prescription drugs, all part of what many are calling a national epidemic of opiate abuse.
The law, which charges a woman with a misdemeanor if she is found to be using drugs, will remain in effect until July 1, 2016. But that law, the way other states apply existing statutes and a recent court case have opened up a fissure between states and the Obama administration on how to best tackle the growing issue of opiate abuse.
For the past few years, neonatal intensive care units nationwide have been caring for a massive influx of babies born to mothers who abuse opiates. A 2012 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed that about 13,500 babies each year - the equivalent of one an hour - are born to mothers who are addicted to opiates. The babies are born dependent on the drugs passed to them through the placenta and must stay in the hospital for weeks while they are weaned off them. The infants may have stiff limbs, diarrhea, seizures, cry excessively, have a fever and other problems while they are withdrawing from the drug.
The problem is particularly acute in Tennessee. In 2013, 921 newborns were born dependent on drugs their mothers used while pregnant; as of June 21 there were 440 cases reported in 2014.
The Tennessee law -- along with a recent court ruling in Alabama that pregnant women can be prosecuted under a law stating they chemically endangered a child and a number of state laws that deem using an illegal drug during pregnancy to be child abuse -- are at odds with the Obama administration's push toward treating, not punishing, low-level, non-violent drug users.
Read the full article.
Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.