Answer Addiction

Tag: narcan and overdoses

  • New Jersey Cop Overdoses On Heroin While On Duty 

    New Jersey Cop Overdoses On Heroin While On Duty 

    The former police officer applied to participate in a drug court treatment program last week.

    A New Jersey police officer who overdosed on heroin while at work lost his job but will avoid jail time if he completes a treatment program overseen by the state. 

    Matthew D. Ellery, a police officer for Franklin Township Police Department, was found unresponsive in his cruiser on April 7, according to USA Today. 

    Authorities first became concerned when dispatch tried to reach Ellery, but was unsuccessful. Another officer went to Ellery’s last known location and found him unresponsive. The officer administered two doses of the opioid-overdose reversal drug Narcan. 

    On Friday (July 12) Ellery pleaded guilty to possession of a controlled dangerous substance (heroin) and driving while intoxicated. 

    Will He Keep His Job?

    He will not be formally sentenced until August 23, but on Friday Ellery applied to participate in a five-year Somerset County Drug Court Program.

    If he does not successfully complete that alternative sentence, he will face three to five years in state prison. In addition, Ellery will no longer be able to work as a police officer, and he will lose his driver’s license for seven months, the plea deal said. 

    Ellery had been with the department since 2016. 

    Ellery is not the only police officer to face issues with substance abuse. Like any segment of the population, police officers are at risk for addiction. 

    Law Enforcement Officers & Addiction

    “Not only are law enforcement officers not immune to addiction, but they are also more susceptible to addiction because the stress of their jobs renders them so,” Dr. Michael Genovese, a clinical psychiatrist and chief medical officer at Acadia Healthcare, told The Fix. 

    Genovese said the stress and trauma of the job can be too much for some officers. 

    “Police officers to whom I have spoken, who suffer from addiction, are not generally using drugs to get high or have fun; they are using them to numb emotions they find painful,” he said. “Every day, police officers witness things that are outside the scope of normal human experience, and the frequency and intensity of traumatic events are overwhelming to the officer’s brain, even if he or she thinks they’re not.”

    Recently two officers—one in Maine and one in Maryland—fatally overdosed. Michael Koch, who worked as an officer for 15 years, said having access to drugs made it easier to fall into addiction. 

    “In 2010 a lot of heroin was on the streets and we were doing a lot of busts where we confiscated heroin, and also things like Oxys. I crossed the line and started taking things out of evidence for my personal use. I justified it by saying it was going to be thrown out anyway, but by that time I’m an addict and living a double life as a well-respected undercover cop and also as someone that was smoking a ton of heroin. Eventually, I got caught taking drugs out of evidence.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Overdose Deaths Dip For The First Time In Decades

    Overdose Deaths Dip For The First Time In Decades

    The national overdose toll declined by about 3,000 between 2017 and 2018.

    Overdose death rates were slightly lower in 2018 than in 2017, the first time in decades that the overdose rate has declined.

    Despite that positive news brought about by preliminary data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) experts emphasized that with more than 69,000 Americans dying of an overdose in 2018 the nation is still in an epidemic.

    Robert N. Anderson, chief of the Mortality Statistics Branch at the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics told The American Journal of Managed Care that the national overdose toll was reduced by about 3,000 people between 2017 and 2018. That could indicate that “we may have reached a peak in the epidemic,” he said.

    Still, he cautioned, the overdose death rate remains extremely high.

    “That said, the number of deaths for 2018 is still predicted to be nearly 70,000. That is a lot of people dying much too young. Even if the decline holds once the data are final, it is too soon to declare victory,” Anderson said.

    The data is based on preliminary models and predictions of what the final data will look like. Anderson said that the models are usually accurate, however, so the trend will likely be confirmed.

    Increased access to the opioid-overdose reversal drug naloxone may have helped save lives and contributed to the lowered death toll. However, that means many people are still using drugs, and Anderson emphasized that the drug epidemic needs ongoing monitoring and interventions.

    “It is really impossible to predict what will happen for the next few years,” he said. “This may just be a lull in the epidemic or some new deadly drug will be introduced that exacerbates the situation.”

    For example, meth use is becoming more popular among opioid users. While there are established medication-assisted treatment options for opioid use disorder, there are fewer options available for people who abuse methamphetamines.

    Although the national overdose rate declined, that was not universal among states. Some states, like Ohio, saw a significant decrease in overdose rates. Others, including Missouri and New Jersey, had more overdoses in 2018 than they did in 2017.

    In general, the CDC data showed that overdoses increased in the west and southwest, and decreased in the east.

    The overdose rate national remains very high compared with previous decades. In 1999 overdoses accounted for 6.1 deaths per 100,000. In 2018, they made up 20.7 deaths per 100,000.

    View the original article at thefix.com