Wade Vandervort
Firefighter Paramedic Tim Velasquez shares his experience with victims of drug overdose on International Overdose Awareness Day at the Las Vegas Fire & Rescue station 1, city center, Tuesday, August 31, 2021.
Sunday, September 5, 2021 | 2 a.m
First responder Tim Velasquez has been to so many drug-related emergencies in the Las Vegas Valley over the past 15 years that he finds it impossible to quantify.
“I’ve given Narcan more times than I can count,” said the medic and firefighter from Las Vegas Fire & Rescue of the brand name of naloxone, an opioid antidote that prevents the drug from reaching the brain receptors, essentially reversing overdoses be made.
He vividly remembers a phone call on November 3, 2019.
In a moment a couple had had a family reunion. Next, the man and woman were sprawled out in a bathroom, unconscious.
Velasquez described the resuscitation measures on the living room floor, the screaming and crying family members surrounding the paramedics. He recalls how in vain the efforts were because the couple eventually succumbed to an overdose of methamphetamine spiked with fentanyl, a potent synthetic opioid that is causing an increase in overdose deaths in the U.S. It’s an epidemic that is going through a global pandemic is exacerbated that does not spare the valley either.
“I can forget it every day,” he said on Tuesday at an event on the International Day of Overdose Awareness. “But as soon as someone starts talking about a certain topic, those things come back.”
Last year, fentanyl claimed 219 lives in Clark County, about three times the number of deaths reported the previous year, according to the Metro Police. More worryingly, the 109 deaths reported from January 1 to May are already up 38% from the already high numbers last year.
The total of 760 drug overdose deaths in 2020 was also about a 30% increase compared to 2019 when 591 people were killed by drugs, Metro numbers show.
The surge in deaths is due to fentanyl being increasingly ingested, sniffed, or injected by victims who are unaware that the drug is being mixed with counterfeit prescription pills or heroin that is being sold on the street, said Daniel Neill, the head of the drug Enforcement Administration in Nevada.
The synthetic drug recently made headlines when the Southern Nevada Health District announced it was suspected of overdose in five deaths on Aug. 12.
It is a crisis that does not discriminate based on age, location or socio-economic status, officials repeat. It’s also one that even gives first responders and law enforcement a personal break.
Take Velasquez, whose brother battled drug addiction and nearly died from an overdose. They grew up in a happy family, he said, adding that if anyone had asked their parents beforehand if any of their sons were susceptible to substance abuse, they would have said it was impossible.
But in such situations, family members ask, “Have I done enough? Could I have done more? Was I too hard on you? ”Said Velasquez.
“Does he know we love him?” said Velasquez and began to collapse. His brother is now clean and married with children.
The same goes for Metro Narcotics Lt. Branden Clarkson, who keeps an eye on his three young children and has a “heartbreaking” thought that they will fall victim to the epidemic later in life if his team doesn’t do enough to contain the problem.
Las Vegas fire and rescue teams regularly respond to overdose calls, deputy chief Dina Dalessio said, noting the “lack of hope” in the country is due to the COVID-19 pandemic, unemployment, political division and natural disasters the substance abuse crisis intensified.
The Americans affected fell into the “depths of despair,” she said.
Your firefighters were dispatched to about 5,000 overdose calls last year, compared to about 4,000 in 2019. So far this year to last week, they have answered about 3,600, Dalessio said.
During these calls last year, Narcan was administered 1,044 times. With nearly 800 counted in 2021 so far, the total “blown out of the water last year,” said Scott Phillips, EMS field coordinator at Las Vegas Fire & Rescue, noting many others died before aid arrived.
Just recently, Phillips answered a call about an unresponsive patient who had overdosed on heroin, an opioid. His parents gave him Narcan, he said at the Fire & Rescue event in Las Vegas on Tuesday.
When we arrived, the overdose victim was awake talking and refusing medical attention, Phillips said.
“Before I left, I gave the family a (Narcan-Kit) for the next time because there will be a next time,” he said at the fire department event.
“That was a big house on the outskirts of the city, a big house on the outskirts of town will probably answer that later today. There will be one behind the supermarket down the street, there will be one on my street, there will be one on your street, ”Phillips said. “It is everywhere.
“It’s real and we’re not winning,” Phillips said repeatedly.
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Naloxone is a Food and Drug Administration-approved antidote for all ages that prevents opioids from reaching the brain receptors that interrupt breathing in such overdoses, said Brandon Delise, an epidemiologist for the Southern Nevada Health District. The drug and simple training on how to use it are available free of charge at the county’s pharmacy through federal Drug Abuse and Mental Health Administration grants, he said.
The health district has distributed about 24,000 doses since 2018, Delise said. It may never be known how many people have used it, but it is “a lifesaver – it saves lives,” he said, “and it’s very important.” Based on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the recommends Health District will have naloxone available to anyone who uses opioids legally or illegally, or knows someone who does, Delise said.
The person giving it should look for signs of an overdose, call 911, and then give the medicine to the overdose victim. Some people may need more than one dose, and even if they respond to naloxone, the overdose may return, so professional medical attention is important.
The Good Samaritan Immunity Act, signed in 2015 by former Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval, allows for widespread use of naloxone and provides immunity from minor drug offenses to people seeking help with an overdose.
The health district, which does not take identifying information, only asks questions related to Narcan use, Delise said. They ask: was it the first time you used it? How many doses were required? Did the person get medical help?
“When they come to the health district, we want people to feel welcome,” said Delise, who has been with the agency for five years. Although COVID-19 has preoccupied the epidemiologists, they wear lots of hats and realize that fentanyl is a serious threat. Data is vital in tackling the problem, Delise said, adding that epidemiologists are studying the trends, which they then share with officials and the community.
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Fentanyl is invading the US from Mexico, where criminal satellites make it using chemicals shipped from China, DEA’s Neill said. The powdered substance is increasingly being compressed into pills that resemble legitimate tablets.
Las Vegas is a passing trade route, but some of those pills stay in the valley. “We’re seizing more, which means more is getting through,” Neill said.
Last year, for example, the DEA confiscated a total of around 50,000 pills, Neill said. Now, a few months ago, agents found the same number of pills during a single bust. “That was unheard of,” he said.
To make matters worse, the street value of fentanyl and methamphetamine, which Neill identified as equally dangerous, has fallen, making them more accessible to the community as a whole, Neill said.
“I’ve seen and talked to parents from all over the valley who have lost a loved one,” the 26-year-old DEA veteran said of drug overdose. “And it breaks your heart.”
Earlier this year, Metro unveiled the Overdose Response Team, deployed on fatal and non-fatal overdoses to find clues for criminal investigations. The task force consists of officials, federal agents, analysts, and the Clark County Coroner’s Office.
By aggressively tracking drug traffickers, Lt. Clarkson, law enforcement wanted to scare them and help cut the supply. At the same time, educating the public about the dangers of fentanyl could help reduce demand for the drug.
