Life-Saving Anti-Opiate Drug Naloxone Now More Widely Available in California
I reported last year on California passing into law a potentially life-saving bill allowing for over the counter sales of the anti-opiate drug naloxone, quoting from a release from the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) that helped push the bill through the state legislature:
Governor Jerry Brown signed Assemblymember Richard Bloom's pharmacy naloxone bill (AB 1535), which will permit pharmacists to furnish the opiate overdose reversal medicine naloxone hydrochloride upon request. Previously, naloxone was available only by prescription from a healthcare provider or from a handful of naloxone distribution programs throughout the state.
Now the CVS chain has announced the drug's availability in 58 stores around the state.
DPA has more on its statewide availability in California, and sums up its value:
Naloxone is a medication that rapidly reverses the respiratory depression resulting from an opiate overdose caused by drugs such as heroin, oxycodone and methadone. It is standard practice for emergency personnel to administer naloxone when summoned to the scene of a suspected opiate overdose. Naloxone has no psychoactive or addictive qualities and very few side effects. After a simple training, naloxone can be safely administered by laypeople, including family members and peers, either by intramuscular injection or with a nasal spray.
More on naloxone's incredibly life saving properties if administered promptly to someone suffering an opiate overdose. If you know anyone who is at risk of an opiate overdose, it's good stuff to have access to, and the federal Food and Drug Administration ought to make it nationally over-the-counter legal.