BATON ROUGE - Louisiana lawmakers, like their counterparts around the country, are considering ways to combat opioid abuse.

Rep. Helena Moreno, a New Orleans Democrat, spent years working on a series of bills that eventually resulted in getting naloxone, the opiate antidote, available as an over-the-counter drug. Now, she's focused on preventing people from getting addicted to painkillers such as Vicodin and OxyContin in the first place.

Gov. John Bel Edwards has backed Moreno's push to limit first-time opioid prescriptions for acute pain to a seven-day supply for adults. The bill passed the House floor recently and is awaiting a Senate committee.

Edwards is also supporting Republican Sen. Fred Mills' bill to strengthen a prescription monitoring system to make it easier for physicians to identify patients who are "doctor-shopping" for pain pills.