A program at Camden County Technical Schools advised parents on drug warning signs in their teens’ bedrooms.
Shoelaces, spoons and strands of steel wool pads were scattered across a replica bedroom at Camden County Technical Schools.
Although these items seem innocuous, they each serve a purpose when met with paraphernalia.
“There’s are things we’ve seen throughout our career,” said Lt. Christopher Dubler of Winslow Township Police Department. “We’ve been in the scene on an overdose situation…Nowadays parents are looking for the old school marijuana joints, but that’s not what you need to be looking for. We’re just trying to bring it up to this day and age.”
The display was an interactive seminar in a substance abuse prevention and opioid awareness program that took place at the Gloucester Township campus on Berlin-Cross Keys Road Wednesday evening. The event was part of Camden County’s “Heroin. Pills. It all Kills” campaign, aiming to fight the drug addiction epidemic in suburbia.
Attendees scanned the mock teenage bedroom with a pencil and clipboard, jotting down clues that allude to drug use.
Some 175 people die every day from an overdose in the United States, averaging a new death about every eight and a quarter minutes, according to Jefferson Health pharmacist Bill Lynch. Drug poisoning is now the leading cause of accidental death in this country for anyone who is 50 years of age or younger. From 2000 to 2009, the rate has increased by nearly 91 percent among youth ages 15 to 19 years old, according to Lynch.
In the state, at least 1,901 people died from an overdose last year, according to NJ.com through data obtained by NJ Advance Media.
In Camden County alone, 191 drug overdose deaths were recorded in 2015, encompassing 115 heroin and 53 fentanyl, according to Lynch.
“We’ve never seen this many heroin overdoses before,” said Lt. Stephen Pearson of the Winslow Township Police Department. “Hopefully, this opens a lot of communication between parents and their children.”
As of September, 135 people under the age of 21 are rushed to the emergency room as a result of an overdose, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Fentanyl is honing in on the forefront of the epidemic, particularly carfentanil. Although the dosage is the size of a poppy seed, it is 10,000 times more potent than morphine, according to DrugBank.
Deaths have been confirmed in New Jersey from carfentanil.
“Fentanyl is a huge issue right now, especially in this area,” Lynch said. “You cannot afford to experiment with this stuff at all…it is a chemical weapon.”
This substance has been linked with the recent surfacing of “fake” prescription pills. When purchasing recreationally, individuals may believe they’re receiving an OxyContin 30mg or a Percocet, but they could actually be given a type of fentanyl pill. These substances are incredibly more potent, causing accidental overdoses.
Camden County has been striving to tackle the epidemic plaguing the nation on a local level.
The county freeholders’ Addiction Awareness Task Force has placed prescription drop box locations across the country, helping to end medicine abuse by disposing of unneeded prescribed pills.
In 2014, freeholders implemented Operation SAL that provides medication-assisted treatment with intensive outpatient services for anyone who has survived an overdose and is waiting for a treatment bed. Just in the past year, the program expanded to include detox, short-term residential services.
The county also offers free Narcan/Naloxone training, which treats a narcotic overdose in an emergency situation.
Lynch recommends adding the medication to first aid kits.
”I’m a practicing clinical pharmacist who is telling you to empty your medicine cabinet,” Lynch said. “We need to take significant action against this epidemic. It is spreading like wildfire, and it needs to be controlled.”
Information:
Narcan Training: http://addictions.camdencounty.com/2017-narcannaloxone-training-in-camden-county/
List of Drop Boxes: http://addictions.camdencounty.com/resources/rx-drop-off/
For CRISIS help, contact community helpline: (877) 266–8222.
