Oregon addiction crisis sparks fervid debate over solutions
Newsy
In Portland, the situation has become so acute that state and local officials have declared a state of emergency.
Late afternoon on a Wednesday in Portland, Oregon’s downtown core, the fire department’s Community Health Assess and Treat Overdose Response Team — a pilot program known as CHAT — were dispatched to a call: A man was on a sidewalk, unconscious and not breathing.
CHAT paramedics began breathing measures for the man as they waited for the initial dose of naloxone, the overdose-reversal drug, to work. They administered another dose and the man gasped back into consciousness.
This was the fifth such call the team had that day.
“Sometimes we're noticing we need more Narcan, and sometimes we're noticing we're able to go with, with less. It all depends on the strength of whatever it is that they use,” said Mandy Boyton, a CHAT team member.
Last year, Portland Fire responded to 7,000 overdose calls. The month-old CHAT program aims to streamline the response to opioid overdoses.
