ANTI-OD GRANT TRIGGERS ALARM

Adopting Narcan Plan Feared

WORCESTER-- A $300,000, three-year state grant awarded to the city
late last month to reduce overdoses from heroin and other opiates has
some neighborhood public safety advocates on guard for what they say
is a creeping shift toward coddling drug addicts.

The Main South Alliance for Public Safety's William T. Breault and
District 4 City Councilor Barbara G. Haller sent a two-page letter
this week to a long list of local, state and federal officials
decrying the "harm reduction" policies of state and local public
health officials.

They fear some of the grant money might be used to expand to
Worcester a state pilot program under which drug users, family
members and others take a training class and then are issued two
doses of Narcan, a nasal spray medication that reverses the effects
of an opiate overdose.

"We've had private conversations with those involved," Mr. Breault
said. "This funding is under the guise of drug prevention, but this
is more about assisting than preventing."

He declined to identify with whom they had had those conversations.

Mr. Breault argued that heroin abusers should be in treatment, not be
given access to a prescription medication that allows them recover
quickly from a heroin overdose and keep abusing illegal drugs.

But Michael Botticelli, assistant commissioner for substance abuse
services at the state Department of Public Health, said the grant
money doesn't come with any specific requirements for its use.

He said the city was given roughly three months to come up with a
plan tailored to Worcester for combating overdoses. The state will
review and approve the plan, but it will not dictate how the money is
to be spent, Mr. Botticelli said.

"It might be doing outreach and engaging people and moving people
into treatment. We know that is an effective strategy in preventing
overdoses," Mr. Botticelli said.

He noted that the state last month also awarded Worcester large
grants for preventing underage drinking.

Derek S. Brindisi, acting director of the city Public Health
Department, could not be reached yesterday.

In April, the state DPH reported that 637 people died statewide from
opioid poisoning in 2006, up from 544 the previous year.

The Narcan pilot program was launched in response to the steady rise
in deaths from heroin and OxyContin overdoses. Mr. Botticelli said
the state is interested in expanding the pilot program, which is
currently in the Boston area, New Bedford, and parts of Cape Cod.

Mr. Breault said his group would resist any effort to allow Narcan to
be distributed here by anyone other than health-care professionals.

"This is enabling and abetting people to continue down that path of
drug addiction. This is wrong with what they're doing," he said.

"All that does is give a false sense of hope to those shooting up,
that if they get a high-quality dose of heroin somebody can bring them back."