When someone overdoses, it does not have to be fatal. Although someone experiencing an overdose is typically unconscious, they can be saved if someone around them takes action. This can’t happen when the overdosing individual is using alone.
Naloxone has been one of the great advances against opioid overdoses. It is a prescription medication that replaces other opioids like heroin or prescription painkillers on the brain’s opioid receptors, rapidly reversing the fatal respiratory effects of an overdose.
Friends and family of those with opioid addiction are able and encouraged to purchase naloxone, and it has saved many lives. However, fewer people are benefiting from it as they are stuck at home alone at the time of overdose.