Following another year of skyrocketing overdose deaths, Baton Rouge city and community leaders are doubling down on efforts to prosecute high-trafficking drug dealers and ease treatment access for people struggling with addiction.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“There’s a lot of bodies that are washing up on the shore,” said Tonja Myles, a substance abuse counselor and local advocate. “We need to go to where they’re jumping in to stop them from getting to that point.”<\/p>\n
More than 300 people died of overdoses in the parish in 2021, according to East Baton Rouge Parish Coroner Dr. William “Beau” Clark. With toxicology results still pending for many of the year-end cases, Clark said the total is approaching 350.<\/p>\n
Those numbers are a dramatic increase from the 242 overdose deaths in 2020, which was a record-setting year for fatal overdoses<\/a>.<\/p>\n Clark, as the coroner, has watched in real time as the opioid epidemic has tightened its grip on the parish\u00a0\u2014 first as people began to turn to heroin when their prescription pain pills ran out, and then as the potent synthetic opioid fentanyl crept onto the scene.<\/p>\n Now, fentanyl<\/a> has all but flooded the market and is almost solely responsible for the number of fatal overdoses in the past year, he said. Fentanyl has even tainted other kinds of drugs.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPeople that normally aren\u2019t opioid abusers \u2014 they\u2019ve used cocaine, methamphetamine and even recreational marijuana\u00a0\u2014\u00a0are now getting those drugs laced with illicit fentanyl and have died from fentanyl,\u201d Clark said.<\/p>\n BRPD Chief Murphy Paul, who convened a group of local substance abuse experts and criminal justice leaders Thursday morning to discuss the crisis, characterized the overdose deaths as a “community issue” that extends beyond law enforcement involvement.\u00a0<\/p>\n He highlighted two initiatives in an effort to offer the public concrete options for addressing addiction in their families and neighborhoods.<\/p>\n The\u00a0“When You Are Ready”<\/a> campaign that has been active for more than a year presents a two-pronged mission: steer people struggling with addiction into treatment programs when they have made the choice to do so, and educate those who have the most contact with people using drugs, such as law enforcement and faith-based groups.\u00a0<\/p>\n Paul also touted an effort established by a newly formed recovery coalition called “One call. Save many,” that urges people to report drug dealers distributing fentanyl to Crime Stoppers.\u00a0<\/p>\n “Those people who are selling that crap and that poison, and you know you’re doing it, then you need to be held accountable,” Myles said.<\/p>\n Tonja Myles discusses the “When You Are Ready” initiative that serves people struggling with substance use disorder when they want to get help.\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Twice daily we’ll send you the day’s biggest headlines. Sign up today.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n Others, such as\u00a0Janzlean Laughinghouse, executive director of Capital Area Human Services, emphasized ongoing efforts to treat addiction using research-proven methods and partnerships amid the epidemic. The coronavirus pandemic merely exacerbated the overdose deaths already trending upward prior to 2020, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe were in dire straits before, and now we are now dealing with the wreckage,” she said. “People who didn\u2019t have problems before have them now; people who had problems before now have them exponentially worse.\u201d<\/p>\n As Laughinghouse and others have repeatedly emphasized, substance abuse is a brain disease that can only be cured through treatment.<\/p>\n This is not a belief that has always been widely held.<\/p>\n Cheryl Wyatt, who acts as Recovery Court<\/a> director for the 19th Judicial District Court, noted that certain treatment options were not used in their program until recently because they were not understood. Recovery court offers treatment services to people using substances who wind up in the criminal justice system.<\/p>\n “Probably up until three years ago, MAT (medically assisted treatment)<\/a> was not permitted because it was seen at that time as one drug replacing another drug,” she said. “So we\u2019ve educated ourselves that this is a disease.\u201d<\/p>\n Medically assisted treatment involves using less addictive drugs like Suboxone or methadone to wean people off opioids, combined with counseling and behavioral therapies. Additionally, the court works to educate loved ones on signs of substance misuse so they can prevent relapses or overdoses.<\/p>\n \u201cJust locking them up?” Wyatt said. “That\u2019s not working anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n When people using drugs are not necessarily ready to begin treatment, some advocate for harm reduction instead. Gjvar Payne, executive director of the Capitol Area Reentry Program<\/a>, works to get people clean syringes, wound care kits and Narcan\u00a0\u2014 the lifesaving drug that reverses opioid overdoses.<\/p>\n Gjvar Payne, executive director of the Capitol Area Reentry Program, shares harm reduction strategies for drug users not yet ready to seek treatment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n
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