Title
Authorizing Council's Committee on Public Safety to hold public hearings examining the effectiveness of utilizing Narcan in response to drug overdoses and the feasibility of its use in the City of Philadelphia.
Body
WHEREAS, Drug overdose is now the leading cause of injury death in the United States. Pennsylvania has the 14th highest drug overdose mortality rate in the nation; and
WHEREAS, In Pennsylvania, more than 12,000 people have died from accidental drug overdoses since 2001. More than 1,600 people died from drug overdoses in Pennsylvania in 2010 alone. Experts say the increase is due in large part to the abuse of legal painkillers called opioids, whose users switch to heroin when their prescriptions run out or become too expensive; and
WHEREAS, Rural overdose deaths increased from about one per 100,000 residents to 13 per 100,000, according to the report by the Center for Rural Pennsylvania. Urban fatalities rose from about three to 16 per 100,000 residents, the study found; and
WHEREAS, Naloxone, commonly referred to by the brand name Narcan, is a safe, effective medication that paramedics use when someone overdoses on opiates (Opiates include: heroin, morphine, methadone, OxyContin, Vicodan, Percoset, codeine, Fentanyl). The medication reverses the effects of heroin and opioids like oxycodone; and
WHEREAS, Administered as a nasal spray or injection, naloxone works by blocking receptors in the brain that opiates latch onto; and
WHEREAS, Fourteen states, Connecticut, New Mexico, New York, New Jersey, Washington, Illinois, Colorado, California, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Delaware, Vermont and Florida, as well as the District of Columbia, have enacted Good Samaritan laws which provide limited Good Samaritan protection from arrest and prosecution for drug charges for people who call 911 in an overdose situation; and
WHEREAS, Pennsylvania had permitted paramedics and doctors to use it, police were not able...
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