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DeWine Convenes State Meeting on Heroin

Attorney General Mike DeWine speaks at a 2014 news conference. (Nick Castele / ideastream)
Attorney General Mike DeWine speaks at a 2014 news conference.

by Karen Kasler

Around 800 police officers, sheriff’s deputies and people from recovery resources came together for what the Attorney General called an “emergency” meeting on heroin. 

There have been a lot of meetings on Ohio’s heroin crisis. Attorney General Mike DeWine says one message he’s still working to get out is that all first responders should carry the overdose-fighting drug naloxone because the growth in the numbers of deadly overdoses appears to have slowed down.

“If that’s true, it’s only true because of naloxone,” DeWine said. “It is not because we don’t have more people overdosing. We do have more people overdosing. We’re just saving more of them now.”

DeWine says more needs to be done to deal with addiction among people in jails, and that law enforcement needs to rethink handling drug overdoses as opportunities to help as opposed to crime scenes.