Pubdate: Tue, 01 Mar 2016
Source: Buffalo News (NY)
Copyright: 2016 The Buffalo News
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/GXIzebQL
Website: http://www.buffalonews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/61
Author: Lou Michel

HEALTH DEPT., POLICE PARTNER FOR CLASSES ON NARCAN

Program's Expansion Targets Opioid Overdoses

Over the weekend, three people died in Buffalo from opiate overdoses.

On Monday, a woman barely survived an overdose.

With the death toll increasing by the day, Buffalo Police on Monday 
announced that they are co-sponsoring with the Erie County Health 
Department more free classes throughout the city to train citizens in 
how to use Narcan, the opiate antidote.

"We are concerned about the health and safety of city residents," 
Deputy Police Commissioner Kimberly L. Beaty said. "Opioids do not 
discriminate. That is why we are making this extra effort with the classes."

The first death last weekend occurred just before 9 p. m. Friday on 
the West Side. A white male, police said, died on the 200 block of 
West Ferry Street.

On Saturday, there were no fatal overdoses, but with Sunday barely 
begun, police received a call of an overdose at 12: 11 a. m. This 
time officers responded to a Bailey- Clinton neighborhood. Another 
white male had perished from an opiate overdose on Kirkover Street.

Then 12 hours later in the city's Old First Ward at 12: 13 p. m., 
police were dispatched to the 200 block of Katherine Street. A white 
male had died from a suspected overdose.

And at 1 p. m. Monday on the 100 block of Mackinaw Street, just a 
couple blocks away from Katherine Street, police and firefighters 
responded to a drug overdose and revived an unconscious woman with Narcan.

The classes on the antidote will target areas where there are already 
many overdoses and Narcan is frequently used, according to Health 
Department officials. Health and law enforcement officials are 
holding the classes in areas they feel will be more convenient to 
people who rely on public transportation.

The first class is set for 6- 8 p. m. March 16 at True Bethel Baptist 
Church, 907 E. Ferry St.

On April 2, from 2- 3: 30 p. m., the second class is set to be 
conducted in New Testament Revival Cathedral, 987 Kensington Ave.

Beaty added that citizens from all sections of the city are welcome 
to attend the classes.

"We are in the business of saving lives," Beaty said, "and there will 
be classes scheduled in South Buffalo where we've had the recent overdoses."

Anyone who attends the classes will receive a free Narcan kit, 
Community Police Lt. Steve Nichols said.

In addition to this effort, Mayor Byron W. Brown last week said the 
city is looking into setting up a program where any individual 
suffering from drug addiction could enter a district police station, 
request help and police would attempt to refer the person to a 
treatment facility.

Health Department officials added that they have been working with 
local police agencies, including Buffalo, for months on making this 
proposal a reality.

Brown mentioned the program in promoting a town hall meeting set for 
7- 9 p. m. Thursday at the North Park Theatre, 1428 Hertel Ave., to 
discuss the opiate epidemic. That event is being sponsored by the 
Save the Michaels of the World Foundation.

Acting Erie County District Attorney Michael J. Flaherty Jr. says 
connecting addicts to help through police stations is similar to the 
"Gloucester Initiative," where the police department in that 
Massachusetts' municipality started a program which allows addicts to 
surrender their drug paraphernalia without threat of arrest and be 
assigned to a volunteer "angel" who arranges for their placement into 
treatment.

"My understanding is that the Gloucester Initiative has helped more 
than 200 addicts and anything we can do to help addicts recover is 
positive," Flaherty said. "What addicts need is treatment, while drug 
dealers need prison."

City narcotics officers last Friday arrested a woman and her son 
during a raid on a 15th Street home where police seized 980 bags of 
heroin and a quantity of marijuana. The heroin was believed to be 
spiked with fentanyl, a synthetic and dangerous opioid that 
authorities say is playing a major role in the fatal overdoses.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom