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Senate panel hears testimony to permanently allow pharmacists to test and treat COVID-19
Summary
Witnesses told the Oregon Senate Committee on Health Care that codifying pharmacists' authority to test and treat COVID-19 would preserve access to outpatient therapies; supporters pointed to federal PREP Act history and pharmacy testing volume while some medical representatives said they remain cautiously neutral.
Senate health committee members heard public testimony April 24 on Senate Bill 295A, which would remove a sunset and permanently allow Oregon pharmacists to test for and provide outpatient COVID-19 treatment when appropriate.
The bill’s backers told the committee preserving pharmacist test-and-treat authority would maintain quick, accessible care for symptomatic Oregonians and align state law with federal actions that have enabled pharmacy-based COVID response.
Pharmacist Kevin Smith, a former Oregon State Pharmacy Association president, said the PREP Act and later federal extensions initially enabled pharmacists nationwide to test for COVID-19 and, after 2021, to provide outpatient therapies where appropriate. “The federal government got it right in 2020 and 2021, and…
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