The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration says it will strip one of the nation's largest drug distributors of its license to sell and ship highly addictive painkillers within 90 days if some kind of negotiated settlement isn't reached.

In a statement, DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said executives at Morris & Dickson failed to accept responsibility for the "full extent of their wrongdoing ... and the potential harm it caused."

If finalized, this action taken Friday would hobble the nation's fourth-largest drug wholesaler. It comes after a controversial four-year delay.

In January 2017, days after Mexico extradited the notorious drug trafficker Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán to the United States, local cops in his home state of Sinaloa fell under attack.

Some were shot dead in broad daylight. Others vanished and were never found. In all, 13 police officers died or disappeared in the months that followed.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved over-the-counter (OTC) sales of Emergent BioSolutions Inc's (EBS.N) Narcan, allowing for easier availability of the life-saving medication used to reverse opioid overdoses.

The formal decision makes Narcan the first naloxone-based drug available without a prescription.

Emergent said it will make Narcan available on U.S. store shelves and online retailers by late summer.

The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved sales of the lifesaving opioid overdose medication Narcan without a prescription.

The agency said the nasal spray is the first naloxone product approved for use without a prescription.

Naloxone is a medication that rapidly reverses the effects of an opioid overdose and is the standard treatment for opioid overdose. 

The U.S. reported more than 101,750 fatal overdoses occurring in the 12-month period ending in October 2022, primarily driven by synthetic opioids like illicit fentanyl. 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved selling the leading version of naloxone without a prescription, setting the overdose-reversing drug on course to become the first opioid treatment drug to be sold over the counter.

It’s a move that some advocates have long sought as a way to improve access to a life-saving drug, though the exact impact will not be clear immediately.

Here’s a look at the issues involved.

WHAT IS NARCAN?

The approved nasal spray from Gaithersburg, Maryland-based Emergent BioSolutions is the best-known form of naloxone.

Claim: The amount of fentanyl coming across the southern border is "at historic lows" thanks to President Joe Biden's immigration policies.

Who said it: White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Tuesday, in response to a reporter's question on Mexican drug cartels.

"Because of the work that this president has done, because of what we've done specifically on fentanyl at the border, it's at historic lows," Jean-Pierre said. "We've done it in a historic way.  That's because of what this president has done."

Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday promised free rein for prosecutors investigating Hunter Biden and his financial dealings.

"The U.S. attorney has been advised that he has full authority to make those referrals you're talking about or to bring cases in other districts if he needs to do that," Garland said during an oversight hearing when pressed by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, on whether the probe would be free from political influence.

Senior Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee grilled Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday about the nation’s fentanyl crisis, the flow of drugs and migrants over the U.S.-Mexico border and the Justice Department’s stance on mandatory minimum sentences.

The moments of drama came during the panel’s first oversight hearing of the Justice Department in the 118th Congress. 

Republican Wisconsin Rep. Scott Fitzgerald introduced legislation Wednesday in the House to combat the ongoing opioid epidemic. Sen. Ron Johnson is set to soon introduce a Senate companion.

Republicans see fentanyl and other opioids as the biggest threat to Americans’ public health, while Democrats say it's guns, according to a new Axios-Ipsos survey.

Why it matters: The Axios-Ipsos American Health Index sheds light on how our partisan divisions — and our education levels — play into the wrangling over public health policies, and how they guide the parties' political messaging.