A life-threatening overdose is a risk for anyone taking opioids, with or without a prescription.
Teens Against Drug Abuse - TADA! Teens Against Drug Abuse ~ TADA is passionate about empowering teens to make a difference in people's lives.
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Save A Life CALL 911
48 jurisdictions (47 states and D.C.) have enacted both Good Samaritan and Naloxone Access laws. Kansas, Texas and Wyoming do not have a Good Samaritan law for drug overdoses but have a Naloxone Access law. These laws protect people from certain criminal penalties if they call 911 to save an overdose victim.
A life-threatening overdose is a risk for anyone taking opioids, with or without a prescription.
Peer Pressure Dealing with Peer Pressure
- In California is is not a crime to report an overdose – call 9-1-1
- Dial 988 for free and confidential support
- Avoid, Avoid, Avoid taking pills
- Ask a Million Questions
Facing constant peer pressure can be hard. The tips we mentioned help, but it’s also important that you are confident in your decision to be drug-free in the first place. Learning the facts and dangers associated with drug use is a good place to start.
USING PRESCRIPTION PILLS THAT WEREN’T PRESCRIBED TO YOU CAN BE DEADLY.
- Criminal drug networks are mass-producing fake pills and falsely marketing them as legitimate prescription pills to deceive the American public.
- Fake pills are easy to purchase, widely available, often contain fentanyl or methamphetamine, and can be deadly.
- Fake prescription pills are easily accessible and often sold on social media and e-commerce platforms, making them available to anyone with a smartphone, including minors.
- Many fake pills are made to look like prescription drugs such as oxycodone (Oxycontin®, Percocet®), hydrocodone (Vicodin®), and alprazolam (Xanax®); or stimulants like amphetamines (Adderall®)
Preventing Opioid Misuse among High School Student-Athletes: Playbook for Students
Do you play sports? If you’ve ever gotten seriously injured on the field or on the court, your doctor may have prescribed you some powerful pain medication.
But even though those medications are prescribed by doctors, that medication can be addictive and possibly even deadly if you misuse them by taking more than you’re supposed to.
No student should have to walk into school with the fear of losing a classmate to an accidental overdose.
Letting Students Carry Naloxone in Schools... BY HON. MARY BONO AND ALLISON FOX
No student should have to walk into school with the fear of losing a classmate to an accidental overdose. Yet many of our nation’s kids have faced that reality as the growing fentanyl and opioid crises devastate schools, families and communities. Just last month in Tennessee, two teenage girls were found dead of drug overdoses in the parking lot of a Fayette County high school, hours before graduation ceremonies.
The tragedies of such events in and around schools are only made more devastating because we know how to protect students and individuals of all ages from letting an overdose become fatal. In addition to efforts to prevent overdoses, access to opioid overdose reversal medications such as naloxone is key to combatting the effects of the opioid epidemic in schools and communities.
States have taken significant steps forward to expand access to this medication for patients at the doctor’s office, for consumers at the pharmacy, and other at-risk populations in the ER and prisons. Now it’s time to allow America’s students to carry naloxone. Let’s equip them with this lifesaving tool.
Only a tiny number of schools allow naxalone
An opioid crisis supercharged by fentanyl is putting our kids in severe danger. According to CDC estimates communities in more than 30 jurisdictions lost 1,808 adolescents to a fatal overdose from July 2019 to December 2021. Naloxone can reverse the effects of an overdose and revive someone who we might otherwise lose forever.
A safe and easy-to-use medication that is administered by nasal spray or injection, naloxone is more widely available today than ever thanks to a commitment from federal and state policymakers to equip patients, at-risk communities, and bystanders. Most recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved over-the-counter (OTC) naloxone.
But only a tiny percentage of school districts allow students to carry this potentially lifesaving medication. We’ve heard from CPR-certified students in Colorado who feel a personal responsibility to be able to save a fellow classmate. In a cardiac event, any student who is CPR trained can be a lifesaver in an emergency. Students should be just as equipped to respond in an emergency overdose situation because they are often closer to their peers than teachers, administrators and part-time school nurses.
At the recent American Medical Association (AMA) meeting in Chicago, delegates debated a resolution in support of making naloxone more available in schools, including to students. Students have been dying from overdoses in high school bathrooms, and expecting nurses to reach them all in time “is just fanciful,” Dr. Ken Certa, Philadelphia psychiatrist.
New legislation would make access easier
Fortunately, states and the federal government have started to build on existing efforts to find solutions that increase access to naloxone in schools.
In Congress, Reps. Dave Joyce, R-Ohio, and Dean Phillips, D-Minn., introduced the School Access to Naloxone Act, which would provide federal grants to help local districts buy and store naloxone for use by trained professionals. At the state level, the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) put forth a policy in February to allow students to carry naloxone at school.
Similar policies have been adopted in Alexandria, Virginia, and Montgomery County, Maryland, coupled with training on how to use naloxone. In Colorado, Durango students are now allowed to carry school-distributed naloxone at school; students pushed for the change after a 2021 tragedy at a home in La Plata County.
This is a proven way to curb the fentanyl crisis
While we should commend those who are working to expand naloxone access in schools, there is more to do. Students will be able to obtain OTC naloxone at a local pharmacy or from entities such as public health departments and non-profit organizations, and we must ensure that school policies don’t prevent students from being prepared in an emergency.
Opponents of making Narcan accessible to students argue that it enables drug use. The reality is, students are using drugs, often without knowing that they are laced with deadly fentanyl. Once someone dies, nothing more can be done to help that person.
Allowing students to carry naloxone won’t solve the fentanyl crisis, but it’s an important way to curb the effects of the crisis and protect our nation’s children from the harms of opioid overdose.