It’s as if an elephant is sitting on his chest, crushing his lungs and making it nearly impossible to breathe. Everything around him has turned into a blur; he hardly notices his buddy shouting his name repeatedly. The yelling that surrounds him turns into crying as he falls unconscious with the needle still in his hand. A moment later he awakens, thankful that he bought more Naloxone at the drug store on his way home today and even more thankful his buddy saved his life again. The availability of Narcan (or naloxone) has made it easier and easier to reverse an opioid overdose, but is this a good or a bad thing? Naloxone should not be administered by non-medical professionals because it enables heroin addicts, waste money, and causes people
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With the demand for Narcan skyrocketing due to the number of heroin addicts increasing, the prices are shooting up just as high. According to the National Training and Technical Assistance Center a single naloxone rescue kit ranges from approximately $22-$60. Depending on the severity of the case, it is important to note that it normally takes more than one dose to save a user’s life. Sometimes up to 10 doses to completely reverse all effects. Morgan Lentes a reporter for WLKY news stated that, “In a year’s time Metro EMS spent more than $187,000 on naloxone. In September alone, metro EMS made 613 overdose runs and used naloxone in 235 of these cases.” Money is being funded to emergency response teams to spend on Narcan when this money could be spent in much more effective ways. Kristen Kennedy with WKYT news team interviewed Chief Brian Wood who stated, “We have projected the increase of Narcan into our budget, which eventually will come from the city, and filter out to the taxpayers.” Not only is the high demand of Narcan costing the hospitals and emergency response teams an enormous amount of money, now it will be the working class paying to support the …show more content…
With naloxone at such easy access users are able to save their own life instead of an emergency service team coming, saving and hospitalizing them. This entire process can add up to a pricy hospital bill for an addict who wants to spend their money on only one thing, so of course they are going to obtain the Narcan on their own. With the process of addicts seeking medical attention being eliminated, fewer users are forced to seek out help to become clean. When one ends up in the hospital and family is notified, the user now has multiple people on their back begging them to get help. With nobody being involved in their addiction, nobody is there to encourage the user to go to rehab. Going to the hospital requires trained professionals to know what they are doing behind closed doors. If an addict has a child in the house, that child will be taken away from them. If an addict has open information on his dealer, they will both do jail time. Needless to say, there is nothing legal about the distribution and usage of heroin. Therefore, the fewer people that know about their addiction the better. Prescribed Narcan makes it easy to keep this secret. This is their free ticket to doing the drug in a “non-life threatening” way, why seek help? It is argued that the distribution is effective because it saves people from an expensive hospital bill. The ambulance ride alone is enough to make an individual
With the demand for Narcan skyrocketing due to the number of heroin addicts increasing, the prices are shooting up just as high. According to the National Training and Technical Assistance Center a single naloxone rescue kit ranges from approximately $22-$60. Depending on the severity of the case, it is important to note that it normally takes more than one dose to save a user’s life. Sometimes up to 10 doses to completely reverse all effects. Morgan Lentes a reporter for WLKY news stated that, “In a year’s time Metro EMS spent more than $187,000 on naloxone. In September alone, metro EMS made 613 overdose runs and used naloxone in 235 of these cases.” Money is being funded to emergency response teams to spend on Narcan when this money could be spent in much more effective ways. Kristen Kennedy with WKYT news team interviewed Chief Brian Wood who stated, “We have projected the increase of Narcan into our budget, which eventually will come from the city, and filter out to the taxpayers.” Not only is the high demand of Narcan costing the hospitals and emergency response teams an enormous amount of money, now it will be the working class paying to support the …show more content…
With naloxone at such easy access users are able to save their own life instead of an emergency service team coming, saving and hospitalizing them. This entire process can add up to a pricy hospital bill for an addict who wants to spend their money on only one thing, so of course they are going to obtain the Narcan on their own. With the process of addicts seeking medical attention being eliminated, fewer users are forced to seek out help to become clean. When one ends up in the hospital and family is notified, the user now has multiple people on their back begging them to get help. With nobody being involved in their addiction, nobody is there to encourage the user to go to rehab. Going to the hospital requires trained professionals to know what they are doing behind closed doors. If an addict has a child in the house, that child will be taken away from them. If an addict has open information on his dealer, they will both do jail time. Needless to say, there is nothing legal about the distribution and usage of heroin. Therefore, the fewer people that know about their addiction the better. Prescribed Narcan makes it easy to keep this secret. This is their free ticket to doing the drug in a “non-life threatening” way, why seek help? It is argued that the distribution is effective because it saves people from an expensive hospital bill. The ambulance ride alone is enough to make an individual