Narcan nasal spray at an opioid educational training class with Callie Crow, the founder of Drew’s 27 Chains, on March 31, 2022, in Caddo Mills.After years of struggling to consistently provide the overdose-reversing medication naloxone to organizations that rely on a free supply of the medication, the state government is revamping its centerpiece distribution program.
In its early days, More Narcan Please was able to quickly ship large amounts of naloxone, delivering pallets of medication to harm reduction organizations at the forefront of combating opioid overdoses. Harm reduction is a strategy for providing services to people who use drugs without attaching stigma or strict parameters and involving people who use drugs in planning and implementing that strategy.; HHSC said that was due to a shortage of the much cheaper injectable version of naloxone.
“A lot of the time when we’d put an order in it would take weeks,” said Bret Flores, executive director of the DFW Harm Reduction Access Movement, a grassroots organization that provides education and resources to people who use drugs. When his organization did receive shipments, “it was just very small quantities,” Flores said.
“We used to get a nice chunk of naloxone from More Narcan Please,” Prado said. “Then I don’t know what happened.”Since Be Well Texas took over naloxone distribution in February, shipping to organizations requesting bulk orders is now happening within about five days, said Jennifer Sharpe Potter, UT Health San Antonio’s vice president for research and Be Well Texas’ executive director.
When More Narcan Please initially launched, about 40 percent of the naloxone it distributed went to law enforcement. Last year, Texas Community Health News found that some recipients of state-funded naloxone , although More Narcan Please was encouraging them to donate it to other groups that would use it.