Colin Maiwurm – Staff Writer
substances. One of these substances that are used frequently is opioids. On Thursday, March 30 the Alpha Sigma Tau sorority hosted a Narcan Training event.
“Naloxone (also commonly known as Narcan) is a medication that can be administered to treat a narcotic overdose in an emergency situation,” said the Gustavus Webpage.This training event was from 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. in the Banquet rooms. It was free for all faculty and students on campus. Within this training session, people learned about what Narcan is and how to administer it. They also learned how to recognize an opioid overdose within someone. In addition to that, they learned what Steve’s law is, which is also called naloxone legislation. Finally, everyone who came to the Narcan Training received their own naloxone kit as well as were taught how to use it.
“The event is a training to educate the Gustavus community on the prevalence of the opioid epidemic, how to identify an opioid overdose, and the steps to take in administering naloxone. Our hope in putting on a much-needed training like this and offering a free Narcan dose is it could save a life,” Senior Chloe Keller said.
While opioids might not be the leading cause of death, that does not mean that there isn’t a problem regarding opioids in this society.
“Approximately every 8 minutes, on average, a person dies from an opioid overdose. In 2021 there was 80,411 reported overdose deaths,” said the Gustavus Webpage.
Even with these high numbers, the Alpha Sigma Tau sorority tries to remain positive. In addition to these statistics, they also advertise that almost 27,000 lives have been saved by giving out Narcan kits to friends and family. One of the main objectives of this Narcan Training event is to spread awareness as well as distribute as many Narcan kits as possible to the community. Their hope is to lower the number of overdose incidences even just a little through these methods.
This Narcan Training event is held in many other locations as well to help spread awareness of opioid addiction. The Narcan Training event at Gustavus this year is supposedly the biggest yet. Over 150 people signed up for the training multiple days in advance.
If anyone has questions or wants to learn more, they can contact Chloe Keller.