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A drug that blocks the effects of opiates and reverses an overdose — and which has already saved more than 100 lives in Utah since July 2015 — is becoming more available.
But bureaucratic delays have slowed its distribution.
Utah loses hundreds of lives each year to overdoses and has among the most OD deaths per capita in the nation, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Yet the state has not been as quick to address legal issues blocking the use of naloxone, says Jennifer Plumb, an emergency room physician at Primary Children's Hospital and a leader in the naloxone movement.
She is pushing to get the drug in the hands of law enforcement officers and other first responders who can save lives by administering the shot to someone dying of an opiate overdose.
"It doesn't get you high, and it's not addictive," she said of naloxone. "If given to a person who has not taken opiates, it will not have any effect, since there is no opioid overdose to reverse."
Yet the drug has not been readily available because of laws limiting how it can be distributed. The goal, Plumb says, is to get naloxone not only to police agencies for their officers to have on hand in case of an overdose, but also the general public, many of whom have loved ones at risk of an overdose.
Three Utah legislators have taken a lead in removing legal hurdles and providing funding to make the drug more accessible. Rep. Carol Spackman Moss, D-Holladay, sponsored legislation that passed in 2014 making it legal for a physician to prescribe naloxone to someone at risk of an overdose or likely to witness an OD of another person.
Reps. Steve Eliason, R-Sandy, and Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, expanded on Moss' bill in the 2015 session.
Eliason's successful bill allows the Utah Health Department to issue a standing order allowing any pharmacy to give out naloxone without a prescription, just like a flu shot.
But the Health Department has yet to issue that order because it is finalizing the rules for the program.
McKell's measure protects law enforcement from liability when administering naloxone shots. He also pushed through a $250,000 appropriation to create a fund administered by the Health Department that police departments can tap into to buy naloxone kits. With rules now in place, that money just recently became available to police agencies.
Some agencies have been using the drug without state funding because Plumb and other health providers have put together naloxone kits, thanks to a small grant.
It costs $35 for a two-shot kit.
The Cottonwood Heights Police Department jumped on the program, using kits made available by Plumb's group. Chief Robbie Russo said his officers have saved four lives in the past few months by administering naloxone to overdose victims. Other agencies have been waiting for the funding to be put in place and for those program rules to be finalized.