In a packed meeting room, stakeholders and officials meet in Henderson County to talk about Kentucky’s struggle with drugs.
Aside from the Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron and Henderson County attorney, panelists include Daviess County Sheriff Brad Youngman, State Representative DJ Johnson and Battalion Chief Colter Tate of the Owensboro Fire Department.
Kentucky Opioid Abatement Advisory Commission (KYOAAC) Executive Director Bryan Hubbard delivered sobering facts about the state’s battle with opioids like fentanyl, using slideshow graphics.
“You'll see our three northern Kentucky counties are colored a kind of a deeper red for the presence of a combination of fentanyl and heroin,” he said from the podium. “The rest of the state that is color coded is bright red from Pikeville all the way into West Kentucky. And that is for fentanyl.”
While several drugs were discussed, this drug came up the most.
According to the KYOAAC, in 2020 alone, drug overdose deaths in Kentucky increased by nearly 50-percent, and was exacerbated by fentanyl and methamphetamines.
According to the Commonwealth, 2,250 died from overdoses in 2021, and 70 percent of these were opioid related. The most recent report shows a slight decrease in deaths — 2,127.
The forum was open to the public and several stakeholders in the opioid epidemic attended — such as judges, school administrators, social workers and families of victims.
Angela Parkerson stood with a sign recognizing the death of her son Nick Rucker, 24. He died of an opioid overdose in 2021. A recreational drug user, he didn’t know he was taking laced with fentanyl. She shared her foundation Never Alone Nick Rucker Foundation to help save children from these overdoses.
“Nobody helped me save mine,” she said, calling out the panelists, telling them they need to do more.
Cameron offered his condolences and agreed more needs to be done.
He said the point of these forums is not just information, but to share new ideas. From previous forums, he’s learned that strengthened connections between organizations are needed.
“We need to foster a stronger relationship between community partners, folks that have been impacted by the opioid epidemic, and our school systems so that we can have better education because we know that our kids are being impacted, and hit by this at an earlier and earlier age.”
This is the ninth forum they’ve held, and it comes at a time when the state has begun to receive opioid settlement funds. Kentucky will receive $842 million over a period of years; so far $18 million has been received.
Henderson County Attorney Steve Gold said he’s conferring with county judges with opioid experience on how to best use the funds.
“I believe that Henderson County received $175,000 for this year, which is a lot of money,” Gold said. “But in the big scheme of things, when you're trying to move the needle on such a massive issue, it's really not a whole lot.”
Gold says Henderson County saw an uptick in opioid overdoses early in 2023 which is against the trend of a slight downturn in the state overall.
Despite this downturn, Cameron says there’s still a lot of work to do.
“… particularly fentanyl that still is roughly 70-percent of the overdoses and poisoning that we see in Kentucky.”
Cameron said there is no set schedule for these forums, so the next is not yet scheduled.