The North Carolina Medical Board has published the following Position Statement on Drug Overdose Prevention.
Drug Overdose Prevention
The Board is concerned about the three-fold rise in overdose deaths over the past decade in the State of North Carolina as a result of both prescription and non-prescription drugs. The Board has reviewed, and is encouraged by, the efforts of Project Lazarus, a pilot program in Wilkes County that is attempting to reduce the number of drug overdoses by making the drug naloxone* and an educational program on its use available to those persons at risk of suffering a drug overdose.
The prevention of drug overdoses is consistent with the Board’s statutory mission to protect the people of North Carolina. The Board therefore encourages its licensees to cooperate with programs like Project Lazarus in their efforts to make naloxone available to persons at risk of suffering opioid drug overdose. * Naloxone is the antidote used in emergency medical settings to reverse respiratory depression due to opioid toxicity.
