VIDEO – COMPASSION AND LOVE –

Aug. 8, 2024 – The county opened a shelter with more than 20 beds and social and medical services on offer and launched a program to offer addiction treatment to people brought to municipal courts for minor drug charges. “No longer are police officers most concerned with arresting anyone…” The overdose-reversing drug is now stocked at schools, on school buses, and in other public areas.

“We have worked very hard to put naloxone into the hands of the people that are on the ground,” she said. The number of naloxone doses administered by paramedics and law enforcement in Camden County has dropped in recent years, a sign that people with addiction and their friends and family are administering it to each other, without having to wait for an ambulance or squad car to arrive.

State laws that make it easier to distribute harm reduction tools such as sterile syringes and naloxone have also made a difference, advocates say. Since a 2021 measure allowed anyone in the state to hand out naloxone for free, the New Jersey Harm Reduction Coalition has given out 200,000 doses, said Caitlin O’Neill, the group’s drug user health and liberation strategist. At least 1,300 people have used them to revive overdose victims.

The group has also partnered with hospitals, including Cooper, to distribute testing strips for fentanyl and xylazine, the animal tranquilizer that has contaminated much of the region’s opioid supply.

“We’re able to expand how people get their supplies, which expands how people are using the supplies,” O’Neill said.

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