By Susan Abram
Daily News
LOS ANGELES — Hoping to stem a national wave of opioid- and heroin-related deaths, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department announced Thursday that deputies from across the region will be equipped with a potentially life-saving nasal spray.
Deputies from the Santa Clarita, La Crescenta and East Los Angeles sheriffs stations along with the parks and community college bureaus will be equipped with 1,200 doses of a nasal spray known on the market as Narcan.
The spray reverses the effects of overdoses related to pain killers, heroin and most recently a synthetic version of fentanyl, a drug that’s up to 100 times stronger than morphine. The pilot program begins on Monday.
Los Angeles County Sheriff Jim McDonnell said while the number of fatal overdoses related to such drugs remain low across the region, he and others noted that the epidemic will likely head West from the East Coast, where such deaths is deemed an epidemic. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that an average of 161 people died across the nation of drug related overdoses in 2015.
“We wanted to be able to get in front of this so we’re not waiting for the epidemic to hit and struggling to catch up with it,” McDonnell said during a news conference at downtown’s Hall of Justice. “I feel like we’re already seeing cases, but we’re on the front end to be ready for what may be coming our way. We’re hopeful we don’t see what other states have seen, but the reality is more than likely we will start to see this.”
Narcan is easy to use and is low risk, McDonnell said, adding that it requires no medical training for deputies.
“Use of Narcan will not cure the addiction epidemic in this county, but using Narcan gives a person an opportunity to make a different life choice,” McDonnell said.
In April, the Santa Clarita Valley saw a spike of overdoses resulting in one death. Within a 72-hour time span, there were eight such overdoses. One person was arrested for heroin possession. The drug contained traces of fentanyl and investigators believed it came from the San Fernando Valley. An investigation that involved four different narcotic operations between May 2 and May 25 resulted in six arrests. At least 20 ounces of heroin, $10,000 in cash and two cars found with hidden traps to conceal the heroin were confiscated, McDonnell said. One pack of heroin was laced with fentanyl, he added.
“I know we’re not going to arrest our way out of this problem,” McDonnell said. “We need to approach this differently. We must examine what is driving the addictions and equip ourselves with knowledge. We must also gather the means necessary to insulate Los Angeles County from the opioid and heroin-related devastation that we’ve seen in other parts of the country.”
The deaths affect all members of a family, McDonnell added, even those who are in law enforcement.
Holding back tears during the news conference, Los Angeles Sheriff’s Commander Judy Gerhardt told reporters her 23 year old nephew Maxwell “Macky” Baker, who was studying to work in the medical profession, died of a heroin overdose in December, just a few months after he was prescribed pain killers for an injury he sustained in a car accident.
“I stand before you today with mixed emotions,’ she said during the news conference. “On one hand I’m so excited with what we’re doing and the progress we’re making with this project, because I know we’re going to save lives. On the other hand I’m devastated, because I’m the face of what opioid addition does to a family.”
Gerhardt and her daughter, who also works at the Sheriff’s Department, helped work on the Narcan pilot program.
“We can’t bring Macky back, but his death doesn’t have to be in vain,” Gerhardt said. “The message I want to send, on behalf of my nephew is to ask we look at addiction differently. We need to remove the stigma associated with addiction, so that people who are suffering can seek treatment.”
With another grant obtained through a network with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, at least 5,000 more doses will be purchased so that more field deputies will have the medicine, said acting deputy director Dr. John Connolly, with the health department’s, Substance Abuse Prevention and Control Program.
“While we haven’t seen the same rates of addiction and overdose here, we know that in the last decade overdoses are increases,” he said. “We know too many people (who) have died. The good news is these tragedies have sparked action.”
———
©2017 the Daily News (Los Angeles)