Cork City firefighters to begin carrying drug that reverses overdoses
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Firefighters in Cork City will be able to administer a potentially life-saving anti-overdose drug from Wednesday.
Naloxone is a prescription-only medication used as an antidote to temporarily reverse the effects of opioid drugs such as heroin, morphine, codeine, and methadone, as well as synthetic opioids such as nitazene.
Naloxone works by displacing opioid molecules from their receptors in the body and brain. It regulates the effects of an opioid for up to 90 minutes and, if someone experiences an overdose, it can help keep the person alive until an ambulance arrives.
The drug can be administered via an injection or nasal spray, depending on the individual and the opioids used.
According to HSE figures, it was administered on 461 occasions nationwide in 2023 — 74 of those instances took place in Cork.
Following training with Rec First Aid — a registered medical training company under the guidance of the Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA) — Cork's firefighters, who are often the first emergency responders on the scene when someone experiences an overdose, will be able to carry the drug.
Going forward, Cork's firefighters will carry preloaded naloxone nasal devices in their trauma bags. Each bag will contain two doses, with additional doses deliverable every three minutes, as needed.
Cork City Fire Brigade's second officer Victor Shine said he and his colleagues had observed an increase in drug overdoses in Cork over the last number of years, and there was a recognition within the service that "we'd have to be able to respond to the after effects of that".
He said having the ability to administer naloxone is "a fantastic development for ourselves, obviously, because we may come across even the effects of narcotics in kind of resting areas on top of tables, benches and so on when we're doing our normal operation duties".
"But for somebody who overdoses, we now have the capability of reversing that situation," he told on Tuesday.
Mr Shine said firefighters already had a very high standard of first-aid training, and the capability to administer naloxone was "the next step that we can actually enhance our skills and to assist our colleagues in the National Ambulance Service".
"So we can co-work very comfortably now with each other and especially with the use of these new medications," he added.