ACPL offering ‘opioid rescue kits’ outside of select branches

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WPTA) - Several Allen County Public Library (ACPL) branches are now offering a lifeline to help reverse opioid overdoses.

The “opioid rescue kit” boxes can be found outside of the downtown, Little Turtle, New Haven, Waynedale, and Pontiac branches with life-saving Narcan inside.

First responders say it’s a crucial tool to help stop deadly overdoses in our community. A spokesperson for ACPL explains that they’ve always offered Narcan inside their branches, but offering it outside can help reduce the stigma of asking for it and save more lives.

“The library has always been here for everybody,” LaRae Bane with ACPL said. “We’re here for the whole community. And that means meeting the community where they’re at. This was a need that we thought we could easily do and it would be, and it would be really important to what our community here in Fort Wayne needs. So it’s really important to us and goes back to our mission.”

She says that the library partnered with non-profit Overdose Lifeline, which offers a heat map of sorts that shows where EMS offers Narcan the most. Library staff say they referenced that map when determining which branch locations had boxes installed.

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