The Henderson County School District now has Narcan anti-opioid kits in every building in the district.
Two doses of the drug technically called Naloxone, are stored beside every defibrillator (AED) box in every district building whether a school, athletic facility or bus garage.
The proposal was approved by the board of education and executed in January, said Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning for Secondary Schools, Chad Thomas.
“It's just one more step to keep our students staff and our community safe, even after hours and ball games because we have a large portion of our community that attends different events. It's just another level of safety for them.”
Henderson Police Department (HPD) Lieutenant Stuart O’Nan said they observed a spike of opioid overdoses in January, which helped propel this project. He said there were about 19 overdoses in 20 days, and four deaths.
He said HPD administered 26 Narcan doses so far this year, which doesn’t include ambulance services and fire departments.
“And that's when we kind of started this whole campaign with giving out Narcan to the community,” O’Nan said. “Fentanyl is the main problem we have. We really haven't seen heroin, hardly any.” He said that trend in overdoses did not continue in February.
They disseminated about 250 Narcan kits to the community in one month.
Both Thomas and O’Nan said Henderson schools have not had opioid overdoses, and they believe no opioid abuse either.
O’Nan said there have been other types of drug overdoses such as on THC pens — but no opioid abuse or overdoses.
“I do think that it is very possible that a kid could bring drugs to school or be exposed to them,” he said. “Just giving teachers and administrators at the school some type of information about how dangerous it is, because fentanyl by itself just takes a few little grains for it to be deadly to the average person.”
Thomas said they are working on educational materials for the public and all grade levels about the dangers of these drugs.
“We're trying to be proactive in saving a life, than being reactive and wish we would have had something,” Thomas said. “There is a fentanyl issue across the nation. And one thing that we know through science and research is that Narcan can reverse an overdose for certain drugs.”