A free merchandising machine that dispenses the overdose-reversal drug naloxone was unveiled this week at Santa Clara College, the primary such campus useful resource within the Bay Space, faculty officers mentioned.
The machine on the faculty’s Benson Memorial Middle will dispense two-packs of Narcan, a nasal spray for delivering naloxone, with directions on find out how to acknowledge indicators of an overdose, find out how to administer the spray and to name 911, college officers mentioned in an announcement. A QR code on the machine additionally has a hyperlink to a California Public Well being Division coaching video on Narcan.
Faculty officers throughout the U.S. have been trying to stem a surge in overdose deaths, particularly amongst youngsters, by rising the supply of naloxone, which might reverse an opioid overdose in minutes.
College students have been the driving drive behind the motion at Santa Clara College to use the ideas of hurt discount, which goals to stop drug-related deaths by offering remedy and companies as a substitute of selling abstinence-only insurance policies, mentioned assistant public well being professor Jamie Chang, who helped spearhead the marketing campaign for the machine.
“With the free merchandising machine that’s centralized within the scholar commons space, we wish to de-stigmatize this remedy and provides college students the instruments and training they should maintain our group safer,” Chang mentioned. “Now, college students completely acknowledge that there are life-saving instruments like naloxone out there, and that they are often a part of the answer to the opioid disaster.”
Fentanyl, a substance sometimes utilized in medical settings that’s as much as 100 instances stronger than morphine and 50 instances stronger than heroin, has been more and more discovered within the provide of different avenue medicine or counterfeit prescription drugs, contributing to the rise in opioid deaths.
The Campus Opioid Security Act, which went into impact Jan. 1, requires California group schools and public schools to distribute Narcan and supply coaching.
Chang, who has been serving to with small-scale naloxone distribution for years, mentioned the dispenser at Santa Clara College is the primary of its sort to be unveiled at a Bay Space college.
“The scholars 100% understood the necessity for this on campus, particularly as a result of younger persons are being hit very onerous by the fentanyl disaster,” she mentioned. “They wished naloxone to be extra accessible. Their advocacy and persistence in looking for options was pivotal to this launch.”
The machine’s unveiling comes virtually three years after Charlie Ternan, 22, died in a fraternity bed room at Santa Clara College a number of weeks shy of commencement. Ternan had supposed to purchase Percocet, a prescription drug he had taken after his surgical procedure, however died after ingesting a counterfeit capsule containing fentanyl.
Ternan’s father, Ed Ternan, launched the Pasadena-based group Music for Charlie to teach younger individuals concerning the risks of fentanyl and counterfeit medicine.
In Los Angeles, USC has launched NaloxoneSC, an internet Narcan distribution program, in an effort to curb overdose deaths on the faculty. This system was based by pharmacy college students and a registered pharmacist.
Free naloxone kits will be picked up at USC’s Well being Sciences Campus and College Park Campus.
