--- title: Prescription Painkiller Guidelines Released by CDC description: The federal government published the first national standards for prescription painkillers on Tuesday, combatting prescription drug abuse canonical: https://time.com/4259639/cdc-federal-government-national-standards-prescription-painkillers/ author: Katie Reilly article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-03-15T18:33:07.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T15:55:20.192Z article:section: U.S. og:title: CDC Releases National Standards for Prescription Painkillers og:description: It's a step aimed at preventing prescription drug abuse and addiction og:url: https://time.com/4259639/cdc-federal-government-national-standards-prescription-painkillers/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: CDC Releases National Standards for Prescription Painkillers twitter:description: It's a step aimed at preventing prescription drug abuse and addiction twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # CDC Releases National Standards for Prescription Painkillers  by [Katie Reilly](/author/katie-reilly/)  ## Katie Reilly Mar 15, 2016 6:33 PM CUT  by [Katie Reilly](/author/katie-reilly/)  ## Katie Reilly Mar 15, 2016 6:33 PM CUT The federal government [published the first national standards](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/health/cdc-opioid-guidelines.html "undefined") for prescription painkillers on Tuesday in an attempt to combat the country’s prescription drug abuse crisis. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the nonbinding rules to address use of medications known as opioids, the [New York _Times_ reported](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/health/cdc-opioid-guidelines.html "undefined"). The guidelines, which align with previous recommendations from addiction experts, suggest that primary care doctors first use ibuprofen and aspirin to treat pain. They also recommend that opioid treatment for short-term pain should last three days and not longer than seven days, less than current common prescriptions lasting two weeks to a month, the _Times_ reported. “It’s become increasingly clear that opioids carry substantial risk but only uncertain benefits — especially compared with other treatments for chronic pain,” said Thomas Frieden, CDC director. \[[NYT](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/health/cdc-opioid-guidelines.html "undefined")\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4259639/cdc-federal-government-national-standards-prescription-painkillers/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4259639/cdc-federal-government-national-standards-prescription-painkillers/"},"headline":"CDC Releases National Standards for Prescription Painkillers","datePublished":"2016-03-15T18:33:07.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T15:55:20.192Z","description":"It's a step aimed at preventing prescription drug abuse and addiction","url":"https://time.com/4259639/cdc-federal-government-national-standards-prescription-painkillers/","keywords":["medicine"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Katie Reilly","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/medicine/","name":"medicine"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4259639/cdc-federal-government-national-standards-prescription-painkillers/","name":"CDC Releases National Standards for Prescription Painkillers"}}]}] ```