‘Invaluable’ click-and-deliver service of lifesaving drug launches on Overdose Awareness Day

A new click-and-deliver service has been launched this week (Monday 31 August) at Rochdale and Oldham Active Recovery (ROAR) by Turning Point to distribute the lifesaving drug naloxone, a medicine that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose.

The social enterprise, with over 50 years’ experience in substance misuse services, is launching the new service in line with Overdose Awareness Day 2020, raising awareness of drug overdose deaths.

Opiods are a class of drugs which includes morphine, diamorphine (heroin), methadone and fentanyl.

The kit includes an intramuscular injection of naloxone which, once administered, allows enough time for paramedics to arrive. The kits are available to order for home delivery on the ROAR website and will arrive within three days.

Graham Parsons, chief pharmacist at Turning Point, said: “There are so many avoidable deaths from opioid overdoses and naloxone is able to save lives, so we want everyone to have access to this vital medication.

“On such a poignant day as Overdose Awareness Day, a campaign aimed at preventing avoidable deaths from drug overdose, it is the best way to launch our new service and highlight why it is needed.

“Footfall to our services greatly reduced since Covid and during lockdown, and we had to ensure people we support could get what they need to avoid an overdose. Normally anyone supported in our services who are using opioids of any kind is given the option to be trained and receive a kit. So the new click-and-deliver service with links to online training and telephone support from one of our practitioners is invaluable.”

Rob Rowe, homelessness and complex needs manager at Sanctuary Trust, said: “It really is a matter of life or death. In the last four months I’ve had to administer Naloxone seven times, each time it gives enough to bring them around until the paramedics arrive.

“Don’t debate, don’t wait, give the shot. It’s during that time you can save a life.”