In a written announcement, the Department of Justice and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said the two agencies want to reduce the volume of opioids manufactured in the United States next year.
The proposal decreases manufacturing quotas for the six most frequently misused opioids—oxycodone, hydrocodone, oxymorphone, hydromorphone, morphine, and fentanyl—for 2019 by an average ten percent as compared to the 2018 amount.
"The opioid epidemic that we are facing today is the worst drug crisis in American history," Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in the announcement. "Cutting opioid production quotas by an average of ten percent next year will help us continue that progress and make it harder to divert these drugs for abuse."
DEA Acting Administrator Uttam Dhillon said that a "significant drop in prescriptions by doctors and DEA’s production quota adjustment will continue to reduce the amount of drugs available for illicit diversion and abuse while ensuring that patients will continue to have access to proper medicine."