ORANGE PARK – Community organizers put the fullcourt press on combating the opioid epidemic Tuesday night during the Overdose Awareness Seminar at Springs Church.
Things started with an expo showcasing the work of community organizations, treatment centers and emergency services.
The audience heard from four panelists: Lakeview Health Chief Medical Officer Lantie Jorandby, Clay County Fire Rescue Battalion Chief and Community Paramedicine Coordinator Glenn East, Clay County Superintendent David Broskie and Clay County Sheriff’s Office Director of Investigations and Special Operations Wayne McKinney.
Jorandby set the scene of how the epidemic began. She said in late-1990s and mid-2000s, doctors were swayed by pharmaceutical companies to prescribe highly-addictive pain medications, which they did at high volumes. Millions were prescribed opiates and became addicted. The state and federal governments later saw the devastating effects and cracked down on the medications, pushing the “first wave” of opiate users to heroin.
“All of the sudden, all of the people who were addicted could no longer get their prescriptions. The states were tracking who was getting these medicines,” Jorandby said. “A cheaper alternative that was easier to get was heroin.”
In 2016 and 2017, synthetic drugs like the potent and deadly fentanyl became more accessible. Jorandby said fentanyl is easy to make and 50 times more powerful than heroin and 80-to-100 times more powerful than morphine.
“It’s much more potent than anything we’ve seen in the last 20 years or so,” she added.
East outlined the problem in Clay County. Citing CDC statistics, he said fatal overdoses increased by 42% in a year-long period from April 2020 to April 2021. He said the county ranked 22nd out of the state’s 67 counties for overdoses of all types and in 2021 Fire Rescue responded to 529 opioid-related overdoses.
He said 72% of overdoses occurred in a residential setting.
“Not out in the street, not out in parking lots,” he said.
He shared an example of a personal experience of the epidemic and said a family member was addicted to heroin. Other than just overdoses, East told the audience to look out for withdrawal symptoms such as muscle aches, anxiety, inability to sleep or nausea.
“Looking back, there were signs we weren’t aware of,” East said.
Broskie said few students were impacted by physical addiction, but the epidemic has torn families apart. He said a close family member was affected by addiction.
“The impact on families is tremendous,” Broskie said. “I deal with the families all of the time.”
The Clay County School District has 40,000 students and 4,900 employees in a county of 220,000 people, meaning almost everyone knows someone who is a student or district employee, he said. With the scale of the problem, the district has traditional drug prevention programs as well as counselors, social workers, and it contracts some services to local organizations.
“Children shouldn’t be impacted that way when they come to school, and as superintendent, I think it’s our mission to care about kids,” Broskie said. “The impact on the school system is heavy when you look at the amount of resources that are spent on this issue.”
From a law enforcement standpoint, McKinney said 2015 and 2016 were high points of opiate addiction and high levels of abuse. Laws in 2018 tightly curbed the flow of prescription drugs, he said, but the problem was far from over.
“What didn’t get fixed was the demand. Based on the laws of supply and demand … some entrepreneur will find a way to make the supply readily available and that’s what we saw,” McKinney said.
McKinney said drugs are coming over the borders and the mail, and fentanyl is easy to ship. On the street, fentanyl takes several forms, he said, and a trend has emerged where drug dealers will give opioid emergency medicine Narcan to customers.
He said law enforcement must partner with community organizations to counter the demand and law enforcement agencies know they cannot arrest the problem away.
“Like any disease, the quicker we can get help and treatment to these people that are suffering from an addiction, the easier it makes it for us to attack the traffickers,” McKinney said.
A list of county resources related to opioid addiction is available at claycountygov.com/community/public-safety/services/od2a.