Compiled by Anonymous, Drug Policy Alliance. March 2001.
Heroin overdose is an unrecognized epidemic in the United States. Several steps can be taken to prevent overdose deaths, including public education, improving cooperation with ambulance and police services, training drug users in CPR and rescue breathing, and addressing treatment and relapse concerns. One of the most effective strategies is the distribution of naloxone (Narcan) directly to drug users.
Doctors in Northern New Mexico are currently prescribing naloxone to drug users for use in case of heroin overdose. Because police are often first on the scene of an overdose, local police in the area would like to be trained in administering naloxone to an overdose victim, much as they would treat a heart-attack victim with an electronic defibrillator machine. First they would like protection from liability should the treatment prove ineffective. (1)
- Heroin overdose is responsible for substantial sickness and death, much of which is avoidable. (2)
- Naloxone is a short-acting opiate antagonist that, when injected shortly after an overdose, blocks heroin's action on the brain and restores breathing.
- A recent Australian study concluded, "Given the proven efficacy and safety of naloxone, the supply of this medication to heroin users should be considered, particularly to those heroin users at higher risk of overdose, (e.g. following discharge from prison). The potential for abuse of naloxone is negligible, it has no reinforcing properties and is strongly antagonistic to opioids. It rapidly produces a markedly unpleasant withdrawal syndrome in heroin users and is therefore unlikely to be abused." (3)
- Nationwide, heroin-related emergency room visits doubled from 33,900 in 1990 to 70,500 in 1996. (4)
- New Mexico has recently led the nation in per capita heroin overdose deaths. (5)
- A sample of British heroin users found that 79 percent of heroin overdoses occurred in the company of friends. (6)
- In the same British study it was estimated that two-thirds of the overdose fatalities in the sample might have been avoided by immediate administration of a home-based supply of naloxone. (7)
NOTES:
1. "Drug May Save Lives of Overdosers", Albuquerque Journal, January 5, 2001, Brendan Smith.
2. Drew, L, Avoidable deaths from drug intoxication, Medical Journal of Australia, (1982) 2, 215; Hall, W., How can we reduce heroin "overdose" deaths?, Medical Journal of Australia, (1996) 164,197; Strang, J., Darke, S. hall, W., Farrell, M. & Ali, R., Heroin overdose, the case for take-home naloxone, British Medical Journal, (1996) 312, 1435.
3. McGregor, C., Hall, K, Ali, R., Christie, P., Braithwaite, R., and Darke, S., It's rarely jus the 'H': Addressing overdose among South Australian heroin users through a process of intersectoral collaboration: Summary of the Report, Drug and Alcohol Services Council of South Australia, National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, University of New South Wales, Australia, 1999.
4. Greenblatt, J. Year-End Preliminary Estimates from the 1996 Drug Abuse Warning Network. Rockville, MD, Office of Applied Studies, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1997.
5. "Drug May Save Lives of Overdosers", Albuquerque Journal, January 5, 2001, Brendan Smith
6. Strang, J, et al., Preventing Opiate Overdose Fatalities with Take-Home Naloxone: Pre-launch study of possible impact and acceptability, Addition, (1999) 94(2), 199-204.
7. Strang, J, et al., Preventing Opiate Overdose Fatalities with Take-Home Naloxone: Pre-launch study of possible impact and acceptability, Addition, (1999) 94(2), 199-204.
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