Skip to content
PoliTrackerPrototype - alpha version 0.1
← Policies

Proposed

Bill · 119th Congress · S 475

Alternatives to PAIN Act

Refreshed 5 h ago

Introduced 2025-02-06Topic: health care

Summary

Summary by the Congressional Research Service

Alternatives to Prevent Addiction In the Nation Act or the Alternatives to PAIN Act This bill reduces cost-sharing and prohibits the imposition of certain utilization requirements under the Medicare prescription drug benefit for certain non-opioid pain management drugs. Specifically, the bill requires such drugs to be covered without a deductible and to be placed on the lowest cost-sharing tier (if any). The bill also prohibits the imposition of prior authorization requirements (i.e., requiring prior approval from a plan) or step therapy requirements (i.e., requiring the use of alternative drugs before a drug is covered under a plan) with respect to such drugs.

Full text and official record on Congress.gov

Sponsors

Action history

DateChamberActionStatus effect
2025-02-06SenateRead twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.refer
2025-02-06Introduced in Senateintroduce
Source: GovInfo Bill Status (Library of Congress), fetched 2026-09-11. Provisions and opinion polling arrive in a later release.