Columbia Public Schools hasn’t administered naloxone yet this school year to reverse an opioid overdose, but if it were needed, all of the district’s roughly three dozen schools are equipped and ready to respond.
Naloxone, an opioid antagonist, is the most effective method of reversing and blocking an overdose of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids. As fentanyl overdoses continue to rise across the country, naloxone — often known by one of its commercial names, Narcan — is increasingly accessible in schools.
The Columbia school district has had naloxone on hand for more than six years, although it wasn’t always district-wide. Its placement rolled out in phases, first at high schools in 2017 via a grant from the Columbia Police Department.
Ken Gregory, director of safety and security for Columbia Public Schools, said naloxone had to be administered during at least one event last year.
The rise in fentanyl has made Gregory’s job scarier.
“These kids are awesome, (but) they’re all going to make mistakes — everybody makes mistakes,” he said. “You just don’t want to see any harm come to them.”
Last year in Missouri, 1,423 people fatally overdosed on synthetic opioids, according to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services drug overdose dashboard. Of that number, 152 were between 15 and 24 years old, and 25 were younger than 15.
Boone County ranked No. 8 in the state for the highest number of fatal overdoses from synthetic opioids and other illicit substances.
From 2017 to 2020, there were nine overdoses on synthetic opioids for those younger than 15; from 2021 to 2022, that number jumped to 39.
“Young people between the ages of 12 and 17 are the fastest growing demographic of overdose deaths,” said Heather Harlan, health program coordinator for Columbia/Boone County Public Health and Human Services. “We want people to be aware of that.”
Farther out in Boone County, Hallsville School District’s policy on emergency medication requires that naloxone be kept on hand, according to an email from communications director Kari Yeagy.
Each of its four district buildings has at least one two-dose box of Narcan, Yeagy said. School resource officers are also equipped with it. So far, she said, it has not been used.
Harlan believes every school district should have naloxone.
“We have fire extinguishers in schools, and we’ve never regarded that as encouraging people to set fires,” Harlan said. “We have it there in case we need to deal with that situation. We hope it doesn’t happen. But it’s there.”
Harlan encourages schools to order naloxone from the website, getmonaloxone.com, a service from the University of Missouri–St. Louis addiction science team, which works with nonprofits and government groups to provide larger quantities to institutions that would like to be supplied with naloxone.
“Our schools are about education, and we want to support their ability to continue to do that,” Harlan said. “It’s just becoming necessary to think of it as what we need in our first aid kits.”
She said the most common source of fentanyl-laced substances is pills — most commonly counterfeit Percocet.
“So you may have a young person who wouldn’t dream of smoking or injecting drugs, but who might even think they have some anxiety, and a friend says, ‘Hey, I’ve got an extra Xanax that my doctor prescribes — why don’t you take that one?’” Harlan said.
She said it would be wise for students to consider carrying naloxone and the Good Samaritan Law in Missouri — which encourages bystanders to help in a medical emergency — nearly always protects them from legal ramifications.
The medication can be picked up at no charge from the Columbia/Boone County Public Health and Human services office at 1005 W. Worley St.
She also urged parents to be proactive about watching for signs of substance misuse.
“If a young person is using alcohol or tobacco or vaping or marijuana, they’re much more at risk for using illegal drugs,” Harlan said. “According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration survey, a young person between the ages of 12 and 17 who experiments with cannabis is almost 10 times more likely to use illegal drugs. So we really have to take lowering the numbers of our young people who use drugs seriously.”
“Children have been known to bring dangerous things from home,” Harlan said. “That would include drugs that they’re not supposed to have.”
Gregory echoed this. “Even the elementary kids, it’s (fentanyl) such a small substance that, you know, you could accidentally ingest it — it could be from a sibling or a guardian,” Gregory said. “Unfortunately, they may live in an environment where it’s being used.”
But he said the fact that the district has naloxone in all schools offers some comfort.
“It’s not something that’s right in the forefront of my mind every day now,” Gregory said. “It’s more of a security blanket knowing that it’s there.”
By Noah Alcala Bach, Columbia Missourian
Tags: Naloxone Opioid Epidemic Overdose School Naloxone
