A group dedicated to stopping accidental drug overdoses is offering a free Narcan training course.
Noam Barnard of Cincinnati’s Coalition for Community Safety (CCS) has been conducting naloxone (name brand Narcan) training for more than two years. Barnard and CCS representatives often train Greater Cincinnati service industry workers, but anyone interested can get trained on administering Narcan, the over-the-counter nasal spray that can stop an opiate overdose as its happening.
CityBeat interviewed Barnard in 2022 when CCS was ramping up community training sessions. He pointed to the prevalence of fentanyl laced into the illicit drug supply as a driving factor for overdoses among casual drug users.
“This epidemic with the fentanyl and the opiates is so bad that we need to be targeting this,” Barnard said.
Data shows the efforts of groups like CCS could be reducing the overdose death rate in Ohio. Harm Reduction Ohio, a nonprofit that tracks and aggregates Ohio drug overdose data, reported around 5,200 Ohioans died of an overdose in 2021. By 2023, that number (which is currently considered an estimate as year-end data continues to be reported) dropped to 4,620. The organization said in a March 8 press blog that increased Narcan distribution and use could have contributed to the overdose death decline.
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“Other factors in the modest (but noteworthy) decline in overdose deaths in the second half of 2023 could be: increased naloxone distribution and use, better access to treatment, declines in drug use levels, perhaps as the effect of COVID wanes, and changes in international or local drug markets that are not yet understood,” the blog reads.
Keeping the momentum going, Kiel Erdelac, owner of Binski’s Bar in Camp Washington, has asked Barnard and CCS to return for another community Narcan training session.
“We had one with Noam already a few months ago,” he told CityBeat. “It was so engaging and great to have somebody who is a little bit more colloquial with how opioids work and what they do.”
It’s not just the crash course on drug testing, identifying an overdose and administering Narcan — Erdelac said the training from CCS creates a judgement-free environment for questions on an uncomfortable subject.
“We always have some questions like, are these people going to get in trouble? If we use this do we end up calling the paramedics? What are the next steps after you’ve done your part?” Erdelac said. “I had a lot of older people show up to that training who asked what we might think of as silly questions, but Noam was very kind and respectful. It helped to make [older patrons] a little bit more confident in asking questions.”
For Barnard, knowing when and how to use Narcan is only one part of the harm reduction equation.
“If you’re trying to go out and party on a Saturday night, get some test strips,” he said.
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Test strips for fentanyl can help prevent an overdose before it happens. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine signed a bill into law in January 2023 decriminalizing the test strips that detect fentanyl and its analogues in drugs. Erdelac keeps his bathrooms at Binski’s Bar stocked with the disposable paper test strips.
“It is a harm reduction technique, and we’re out here to try to make sure that our neighbors are as safe as humanly possible,” he said. “[Some people] may not agree with it necessarily, but we want everybody to be safe.”
The drug xylazine has crept into the local drug supply since CityBeat last spoke with Barnard in 2022. Also known as tranq-dope, xylazine is a non-opioid veterinary tranquilizer that can cause drowsiness and amnesia, along with slowed breathing, heart rate and blood pressure. The drug is known to cause scaly wounds on all parts of the body, known as eschar, giving xylazine the nickname “zombie drug.”
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Barnard tells his trainees they may need to be prepared to perform additional life-saving measures. Unlike fentanyl, a xylazine overdose cannot be reversed through Narcan.
“Realize that once you administer that Narcan they might need some rescue breathing as well. It’s not the chest compressions, it’s the breathing,” he said.
The free training at Binski’s Bar is scheduled for Tuesday, March 26 from 6-7 p.m. Erdelac wants people to learn how to save lives to protect the neighborhood he loves.
“Camp Washington is poised to be a really cool, great neighborhood and I think maybe the next new Northside at some point,” he said. “It’s a neighborhood that really doesn’t have a lot of spotlight on it. You have a lot of unhoused people that are our neighbors here. If they’re going down, we’d like to be here to help bring them back up.”
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This article appears in Mar 6-19, 2024.