Alarmed by a sharp rise in opioid deaths last year in the third largest city in Massachusetts, officials have taken steps to try to lower the fatality rate.
After years of efforts to begin a needle exchange program in Springfield, Tapestry Health started operating one in a strip mall storefront in February.
Tapestry’s Pedro Alvarez said the organization also distributes overdose antidote kits containing naloxone, better known by the brand name Narcan, in high drug use areas.
" We are at homeless encampments, we are in shooting galleries, we are in alleyways, we are in downtown, we are in bus terminals, pretty much anywhere we are needed," said Alvarez.
Mercy Medical Center and the Springfield police have begun visiting the homes of people discharged from emergency departments after overdoses to talk with them about treatment options.
