This commentary is by Ed Baker of Burlington. He has lived experience as a person with drug addiction. He is a member of the Academy of Certified Social Workers, retired from a career in the substance use field. He is currently an activist for public health in Vermont.
Years of laying needed groundwork, educating the public, decreasing stigma and enlisting repeated testimony from noted experts in the addiction-health field culminated last year in the historic passage of H.72, or Act 178, an act providing for the creation of an overdose prevention center, or OPC, in Burlington.
My deepest gratitude is reserved for the waves of loving advocates who together have made this possible by not giving up, by persevering over time.
Overdose prevention centers save lives by reducing overdose deaths and connecting people to ongoing care. They provide access to sterile supplies and overdose reversal medication, as well as connections to critical health and social services. OPCs complement existing prevention, harm reduction and treatment interventions. Overdose prevention centers provide a safe space for people to consume pre-obtained drugs under the supervision of trained staff, without fear of arrest. They are proven to save lives and improve health and safety. OPCs are a vital part of building a health approach to drugs that embraces the dignity and wellbeing of people who use drugs, their families and their communities.
Since passage of H.72 guidelines have been issued by the Vermont Department of Health, funding has been secured through opioid settlement funds, and Burlington Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak’s office has embarked on a highly prioritized plan to open Burlington’s overdose prevention center as soon as is possible.
There is hope now that we will institutionalize what has proven worldwide to be a remarkably effective intervention focused upon saving the lives of the most vulnerable among us. These are neighbors with chronically unmet needs, complex medical diagnoses, very often unsheltered and with severe substance use disorder. They are dying at unprecedented frequency due to accidental drug overdose as a result of the unregulated drug supply’s increasing lethality over time. Chittenden County tragically has recorded the highest number of these deaths consistently, with approximately half these deaths occurring in Burlington.
No one should die from an overdose. There are many people at high risk for accidental drug overdose in the Burlington area and we as Burlingtonians now have the opportunity to offer them the support and services they need to harm themselves and the community less, and to engage in health-promoting relationships.
This initiative will need the support of the Burlington community to have maximum impact, save lives and improve the common quality of life here in our town. “It takes a village.” There is no doubt our common suffering has increased exponentially over the recent past, for very powerful and complex reasons. An overdose prevention center is one of myriad responses needed to improve conditions for everyone over time,
The pieces are falling into place as we speak:
- The need is overwhelming, at crisis point. Drug overdoses are frequent in Burlington, often resulting in death.
- The data are more than clear. Overdose prevention centers work, they save lives and engage people in health-promoting relationships;
- Burlington’s OPC is funded entirely by opioid settlement funds through 2028. None of these funds are Vermont tax-based.
- Burlington’s Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak and her team are ambitiously and fully committed to providing a safe home for our OPC.
- The Vermont Department of Health has fully developed its guidelines for our OPC, as directed by H.72 (Act 178).
- The community of people using drugs in Burlington has expressed strong interest in engaging in the life-saving interventions that will be offered at our OPC.
- There is a mounting groundswell of compassion in the community supporting this historic public health innovation.
This is our golden opportunity to come together as a community and align ourselves with justice.
This is our moment to join together in our common suffering and take decisive and meaningful action to meet the needs of our most vulnerable in the midst of an unprecedented and undeclared public health emergency.
This is an historic moment for Burlington and will test our mettle for sure.
If your group would like to schedule a presentation on the purpose and potential of our overdose prevention center, including time for questions and discussion, free of charge, please email me.
This is the time for informed decision making.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Ed Baker: Burlington’s overdose prevention center will save lives soon.