nj.com: Inside law enforcement's fight against the opioid crisis in Hudson County
10/10/2017
(Staten Island Advance file photo)
Hoboken Police Officer Steve Albert expected to find a person shouting in the middle of the street when he responded to a disorderly persons call on Aug. 29. Instead he found a man lying on his back, unresponsive near Jackson and First streets.
The man was a known drug user and every sign pointed to an overdose. Albert administered two doses of Narcan and several moments later the man opened his eyes as he was being intubated in the back of an ambulance.
The incident represented the fifth time in 10 months Albert administered Narcan while on duty.
Law enforcement officers in Hudson County began using Narcan – a naloxone-based nasal spray used to reverse the effects of opioids – in 2015. And since then, municipalities have not only seen an uptick in deployments, but also an increase in the number lives saved.
One of Hoboken's Narcan kits kept in each patrol car. (Caitlin Mota | The Jersey Journal)
An analysis by NJ Advance Media found that nearly 2,000 people died of opioid overdoses in New Jersey in 2016, the highest on record for the state. Gov. Chris Christie has recently announced a $200 million plan to fight the heroin epidemic in New Jersey.
In Hoboken, Chief Ken Ferrante says his officers have administered Narcan more than 40 times since December and the department has roughly a 75 percent success rate. When the Attorney General’s Office released guidelines for police officers to carry and use Narcan, Ferrante said the department jumped on getting its officers trained.
“Anything that is an added life-saving measure … it seemed like it had been used in other states with positive results,” he said.
Hoboken appears to have the highest number of recorded law enforcement Narcan deployments in Hudson County, according to records from the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office.
Since 2015, the drug has been used by police officers in the county more than 100 times, resulting in at least 84 lives saved. These numbers only include deployments for police departments and do not reflect saves by EMTs or anyone else equipped with Narcan.
Hoboken police officers Jennifer Lee and Steve Albert with Chief Ken Ferrante. (Caitlin Mota | The Jersey Journal)
Administering Narcan is easy, officers trained to deliver the drug say.
Jennifer Lee, the Narcan coordinator for the Hoboken Police Department, said officers are required to take just a four-hour class before they can administer the drug. The training, she said, is beneficial for anyone, not only police officers.
A Narcan kit costs around $50 for law enforcement, but the drug is also available over the counter to the public in New Jersey.
(MaryAnn Spoto | NJ Advance Media)
Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez said equipping police officers with the “potentially lifesaving tool” in the state’s most densely populated county has “proven correct time and time again.”
“Police are often the first responders in an emergency and in overdose cases, time is always paramount,” Suarez said.
Heroin and fentanyl -- a powerful synthetic opioid up to 100 times stronger than morphine --are strong enough to become addictive after just one dose and has proven to affect people of all races and economic standings. In Hoboken, a city of 55,000, Ferrante said overdose victims treated by police come from all walks of life – from married adults with children to single residents living below the poverty line in public housing complexes.
And law enforcement continues to find ways to help fight the opioid crisis.
Suarez said her office has been working with Jersey City Medical Center to try help overdose victims seek long-term recovery treatments. One of the programs people suffering from the addiction are encouraged to participate in is the Opioid Overdose Recovery Program that RWJBarnabas Health brought to JCMC.
Suarez said she hopes to help expand the program into other hospitals in Hudson County.