Overdose RADAR Act
Latest action. Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
Overdose Response Action Data for Actionable Reforms Act or the Overdose RADAR Act
This bill explicitly exempts the sale of fentanyl test strips from criminal penalties under federal law. It also establishes grants and expands agency efforts to treat opioid overdoses and improve related monitoring and data.
Specifically, the bill exempts the sale, interstate transportation, import, or export of fentanyl test strips from criminal penalties under the Controlled Substances Act. (Fentanyl test strips are used to detect the presence of fentanyl in drugs.)
Additionally, the bill allows the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to provide grants for trained personnel at elementary and secondary schools to administer drugs and devices for emergency treatment of known or suspected opioid overdoses. The bill also expands existing SAMHSA grants to allow state, local, and tribal entities to provide training to health care providers on how to administer such drugs and devices.
Also, SAMHSA may award grants to state and local entities to improve data and surveillance (e.g., postmortem toxicology testing) on opioid-related overdoses. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention must temporarily award grants to municipal wastewater treatment facilities to analyze the prevalence of illicit substances (e.g., fentanyl) in wastewater.
Finally, the Office of National Drug Control Policy must issue guidance for states and localities that overdose deaths should be recorded as homicides if there is evidence that the overdose was not self-induced and intentional.
Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Introduced in Senate" stage on February 24, 2025. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.
Where is it in the process, and what happens next?
4 steps remain before this bill could become law.
The record's latest action, on February 24, 2025: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
- Clearing the committees it was referred to, and being scheduled for a floor vote
- Passage by the Senate
- Passage by the House
- The President's signature. If the President vetoes it, two-thirds of both chambers must vote to override.
How likely is it to become law?
Civibrief does not forecast outcomes and this page has no opinion about this one. What the record supports is a base rate, which is a fact about the whole pile, not a prediction about this measure.
In the 118th Congress (2023-24), 274 of the 16,565 bills and joint resolutions introduced became law, about 1.7 percent. That count covers every measure at every stage, including the many that never left committee.
This one is not there yet: 4 steps are still outstanding, listed above.
Has anyone actually voted on it?
No. No roll call in this Congress cites this measure. That is the ordinary outcome: most measures never reach a recorded floor vote, and a committee ends most of them simply by not acting.
A vote is not the only thing that happens to a measure. Hearings, markups, and referrals are all recorded actions, and none of them is a vote of the full chamber.
Who is behind it?
Rick Scott (R-FL) introduced it on February 24, 2025. No cosponsors are recorded.
Cosponsoring is a formal signature on the text. It is not a commitment to vote for the measure, it does not bind anyone's party, and a long list of cosponsors is a measure of attention rather than of prospects.
How long has it been in play?
It was introduced on February 24, 2025, 563 days ago. The most recent recorded action was 563 days ago, on February 24, 2025.
Measures do not carry over. Anything the 119th Congress has not finished by January 3, 2027 dies when the term ends, and has to be introduced again from the start in the next Congress.
Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.
Vote history
- SenateIn committee, no floor vote yet
- HouseAwaits Senate passage
- PresidentAwaits both chambers