i also want to thank dr. miller and johns hopkins for your warm welcome and hospitality. the work you do makes a huge difference in our community and around the globe. i also thank our esteemed guest, governor hogan and pugh for joining us. we're honored to have you in our presence. of course i thank our witnesses, governor chris christie, commissioner wynn, dr. comperned, and mr. baum. thank you for testifying and for all you are doing to help us combat opioids and save lives. a year and a half ago at our committee's first hearing on this issue, i warned that so many people were dying in communities across america and that we can no longer ignore this emergency. today the centers for disease control and prevention estimates that more than 64,000 drug ns died from overdoses in 2016, an increase of more than 20% over the year before. to put this in perspective, the death toll from drug overdoses last year alone was higher than ll u.s. military casualties in vietnam and iraq wars combined. every 20 minutes, every 20 minutes someone die from an opioid overdose. if today's he

i want to thank dr. miller for your hospitality. thank you for joining us. we are honored to have you in our presence. thank you for testifying and for all that you are doing to help us combat opioids and save lives. a year and a half ago in our committee's first hearing on the issue, i warned that so many people were dying in communities across america and that we could no longer ignore this emergency. today the centers for disease control estimates that more than 64,000 americans died from drug overdoses in 2016 and that's an increase of more than 20% over the year before. to put it into perspective, the death toll from the overdoses last year alone was higher than allus military casualties in iran and iraq wars combined. every 20 minutes, every 20 minutes someone dies from an overdose. if it lasts for two hours, a half dozen families will have lost a parent, a sibling or a child to opioids. we have the reports and you had years of talk. now it's time for action. the american people are looking for us to take action. they are looking to the president and t