Great story from KPCC:
http://www.scpr.org/news/2017/06/07/72625/la-sheriff-equips-deputies-to-stop-opioid-ods/
LA Sheriff's Commander Judy Gerhardt, whose nephew died of an opioid
overdose in Dec. 2016, helped spearhead the department's plan to equip
deputies with naloxone.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is poised to become one of
the largest law enforcement agencies in the country to equip its patrol
deputies with naloxone, a drug that can stop an opioid overdose.
The agency is expected to hand out naloxone nasal spray kits to 600
deputies this week, with an eye toward getting the drug to more than
3,000 of its street cops by the end of the year, according to Commander
Judy Gerhardt.
It was Gerhardt who spearheaded the department’s initiative after the
growing opioid epidemic touched her personally.
"Six months ago, my 23-year-old nephew passed away from an opioid
overdose," Gerhardt told KPCC. "I’ve watched firsthand the
devastation."
Her nephew, Maxwell Baker, died Dec. 28 at his Boston area home. Much of
the epidemic has been concentrated in New England states, but health and
law enforcement officials fear the problem may soon be just as bad in
Southern California.
(In April, NPR interviewed Baker’s father and Gerhardt’s brother – a
physician – about how to address the nation’s opioid problem.)
Coincidentally, Gerhardt’s daughter already was working on the issue.
Unbeknownst to Gerhardt, Sheriff Jim McDonnell had asked her daughter,
who works as a civilian in his office, to research naloxone.
"Life works in mysterious ways," Gerhardt said.
When Gerhardt told McDonnell about her nephew’s death and desire to
prevent more, the sheriff gave her the green light to work on a plan to
get naloxone into the hands of deputies.
"That’s when I realized we really had a chance to make a
difference," she said.
Naloxone is a medication that reverses the respiratory depression
resulting from an opiate overdose caused by drugs like heroin, oxycodone
and methadone, according to the Drug Policy Alliance. After a simple
training, naloxone can be safely administered by laypeople, including
police officers and family members. The drug is delivered by injection or
with a nasal spray.
Until 2015, it was available only by prescription from a medical provider
or from a handful of distribution programs. Now, many pharmacies carry it
as an over-the-counter drug thanks to a law passed by the California
legislature and signed by Governor Brown.
Under the sheriff’s plan, deputies will carry Narcan in their patrol
cars. Narcan is the brand name for a device that delivers naloxone
through a nasal spray. The first two-dose kits will go to deputies in
places where OD's are more likely – community colleges, county parks,
East L.A. and Santa Clarita, where Henry Mayo Hospital reported 8 opioid
OD’s in one recent 24-hour-period, Gerhardt said.
The kits cost about $75 apiece. The money is coming from a state grant
distributed through the county health department.
No longer will deputies have to wait for paramedics as they watch someone
struggle for life in the midst of an opioid overdose.
"I don’t want my nephew’s death to be in vain," said Gerhardt.
"Maybe those people who are struggling with the disease of addiction
can live another day to at least have the choice to seek treatment and
get help" thanks to a deputy who carries naloxone, she said.
Other law enforcement agencies in California already carry naloxone,
including the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department. Its deputies started
carrying the spray back in 2014.
The LAPD is expected to start handing out naloxone to about 100 officers
who deal directly with homeless people on Skid Row and elsewhere in a
smaller pilot program later this summer.
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