Naloxone, also known as Narcan, may not be needed at every street corner, but how about every city bus stop?
Lt. Zakariya Reed, EMS bureau supervisor for the Toledo Fire & Rescue Department, is all in when it comes to helping drug users recover from an opiate overdose, especially when products as ubiquitous as marijuana may be laced with fentanyl, unbeknownst to those who are aficionados of Mary Jane.
One result of Lieutenant Reed’s initiatives is that emergency personnel with the Toledo Fire & Rescue Department may offer naloxone kits for free, along with information on recovery services, whenever called to a home with an overdose situation.
Now, pharmacies, such as CVS, Walgreens, Rite Aid, Walmart and Kroger, are offering kits, with two 4-milligram doses, for about $45 over the counter. The move follows approval in March of 2023 by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration, when it also acknowledged in a news release that drug overdose continues to persist as a major public health issue, with more than 101,750 reported fatal overdoses occurring in the 12-month period ending in October of 2022.