Woman focuses on opioid addiction stigmas after son's death

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - A woman whose nonprofit was instrumental in passage of a law last year allowing Indiana residents to get a drug that reverses overdoses of opioid drugs is now focusing on stigmas related to opioid addiction.

The anti-overdose drug, naloxone, more commonly known by the brand name Narcan, can quickly revive someone who has stopped breathing after overdosing on opioids. Only first responders and emergency workers were permitted to carry the anti-overdose drug until legislation dubbed Aaron's Law was signed in April 2015 by Gov. Mike Pence.

The law is named after Justin Phillips' son Aaron Sims, who died in 2013 of a heroin overdose. Phillips said her nonprofit Overdose Lifeline prepares free Narcan kits for families and caregivers who look after loved ones addicted to opioids.

"The intramuscular kits are what we give to families for free," Phillips said. "Two syringes and two doses. We train them how to do it, and we provide them with treatment referral resources."

The Indianapolis Star (http://indy.st/25JKZTL ) reports Phillips is trying to get rid of the stigma that heroin users somehow occupy a lower rung of society than people addicted to prescription opioids.

"There has been a longtime stigma that heroin is somehow a 'dirtier' drug than prescriptions," said Dr. Dan O'Donnell, medical director at Indianapolis EMS. "While they are all bad, one is certainly not cleaner than others."

Phillips said that she has "had people say to me, 'Well, I lost my son to prescription drugs, not heroin.'"

"It feels better for them. They're not like me, because I'm heroin," she said. "Like I'm still the bad, dirty one, and they're not."

O'Donnell said that when many addicts can't get pills due to cost or not having access, they'll start using heroin.

"Heroin knows no race, gender or socioeconomic status," O'Donnell said. "I think it is easier to say people are losing their kids to opiates, which is pills and heroin."

___

Information from: The Indianapolis Star, http://www.indystar.com