Nathan Beaver Comments on DEA’s Second Extension of Telehealth Prescription Rule
Foley & Lardner LLP partner Nathan Beaver is quoted in the Law360 article, “DEA Issues 2nd Extension Of Telehealth Prescription Rule,” commenting on the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency’s (DEA) decision to extend a temporary pandemic era rule allowing providers to prescribe controlled substances via telehealth without first seeing a patient in person until December 31, 2024.
Beaver noted that to address matters of special registration for telehealth practitioners and in person requirements, the agency would have likely needed to issue at least another notice for proposed rulemaking ahead of the upcoming November 11, 2023, expiration of the initial extension. “It really meant that there was no choice but for them to extend this temporary extension,” he explained. “There was just no way around it.”
Beaver continued that with the potential for at least one more notice for proposed rulemaking, the agency may need to issue a third extension.
“It almost certainly means that the DEA will be required to issue a third extension because there’s no way for the final rulemaking process to come into effect and be completed prior to the end of 2024,” Beaver said.
Beaver added that while the new temporary rule extension gives some certainty until the end of next year, it also presents some difficulties for companies who had planned for the first extension to expire on November 11.
“There are certainly many companies who have spent time trying to come into compliance with what they thought the new rules might be, and now this shifts again to the status quo,” he said.
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