Chronic pain patients should not be treated like collateral damage in America’s war on drugs.

This petition is not a call for reckless prescribing. It is a call for responsible, individualized medical care between patients and qualified clinicians.

For years, many legitimate chronic pain patients have been caught between fear-based prescribing, pharmacy denials, insurance barriers, government pressure, and public stigma.

People who are not seeking a high — people trying to function, sleep, work, parent, worship, and survive — are too often dismissed, undertreated, or abandoned.

America can fight addiction without forcing pain patients to suffer in silence.

The current approach has created a dangerous contradiction.

Chronic pain patients are often told to “try something else,” while many are pushed toward alcohol, risky over-the-counter medication use, or unsafe alternatives outside medical supervision.

Meanwhile, illicit street drugs remain a deadly crisis. Punishing legitimate patients has not solved addiction. It has only added suffering.

Even the CDC’s 2022 opioid prescribing guideline says it should not replace clinical judgment, should not be used as an inflexible standard of care, and should not lead to rapid tapering or abrupt discontinuation of opioids for patients.

We are asking Congress and federal agencies to:

1. Protect individualized pain care from rigid government, pharmacy, insurer, or corporate limits.

2. Stop policies that pressure doctors into abandoning stable chronic pain patients.

3. Protect clinicians who responsibly treat pain using documented medical judgment and risk-benefit analysis.

4. Require insurers and pharmacies to give clear, appealable reasons before blocking lawful prescriptions.

5. Expand access to pain specialists, non-opioid options, interventional care, physical therapy, and whole-person pain treatment.

6. Separate legitimate chronic pain treatment from illicit drug trafficking in law, enforcement, and public messaging.

Chronic pain patients are human beings.

Relief is not addiction.

Responsible care is not a crime.

Congress must act.