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28
PM with Tim Palmer: Heroin users
to get access to ‘life saving’ drug
Penny Timms,
ABC Local Radio
&
Radio National
(15/12/15)
TIM PALMER: The drug used to
reverse the effects of opioid
overdose will soon be available
over the counter. It comes as
anecdotal evidence points to a rise
in the use of heroin, and subsequent
overdoses.
When the change comes into effect,
Australia will become just the
second country in the world to
make the drug available, without a
prescription.
Penny Timms reports
PENNY TIMMS: Naloxone is a
medication, widely used to treat
people having an opioid drug
overdose.
STEPHEN PARNIS: So I would use it
in my emergency department when
someone is brought in with a
suspected overdose of something
like heroin or morphine.
PENNY TIMMS: Stephen Parnis is a
doctor who works in emergency
medicine. Naloxone is a drug he
only administers when a patient is
at risk of dying at any moment.
STEPHEN PARNIS: They have
stopped breathing, they are blue.
It’s often quite satisfying to know
that very soon after giving that drug
into their muscle or into a vein that
they start breathing again and
recover fairly quickly.
PENNY TIMMS: For years, reform
campaigners have argued that the
drug’s life-saving effectiveness
means that Naloxone should be an
over-the-counter drug. Giving
heroin users easier access will, they
say, preserve more lives. It’s an
argument that the regulator,
Australia’s Therapeutic Goods
Administration (TGA), now
accepts.
From next year, Naloxone will be
almost as easy to get as high
strength cold and flu tablets. The
timing of the change may be no
coincidence, given repeat warnings
that heroin use is rising once more.
Professor Paul Dietze from the
Burnet Institute, for medical
research and public health action.
PAUL DIETZE: I guess it’s
recognition that people are
continuing to die, the numbers are
actually increasing a little at the
moment. It has sort of brought it
back onto the agenda and finally,
thankfully, we’re actually moving
towards making it more available.
PENNY TIMMS: Australians are
generally recognised as heavy
consumers of illicit drugs. It’s a
view supported by the data in the
most recent United Nations’ World
Drug Report in 2014. Heroin
seizures by police are up
substantially. So too are deaths
blamed on the drug, according to