Dearborn fighting drug addiction with free Narcan vending machine
(CBS DETROIT) - At the John Dingell Transit Center in Dearborn, folks can ride a bus, hop on a train and now, help save a life with a push of a button.
"Did you ever think you'd ever see the day that there's a free Narcan vending machine right here in Dearborn," a man at the train station was asked. "Never," he replied.
Just inside the doors and around the corner is a vending machine filled with free Narcan.
Dearborn Director of Public Health Ali Abazeed says it's the first of several interventions to curb the rise of opioid related overdoses across the city.
"You come to the machine, it's really simple. You're just, you're going to press the buttons, which have already been programed to administer the Narcan," Abazeed says.
A heated map highlighting Dearborn's drug overdoses across the city shows which areas of the city have been hit the hardest.
Abazeed says the latest and most notable overdoses are the death of two teens earlier this week.
"Narcan is a proven lifesaving medication shown to reverse overdoses in emergency situations. And what we've launched here is this department is a response to the opioid epidemic in the city," Abazeed says.
Stopping by the machine on Friday was SAFE Recovery Coach Rabih Darwiche.
"This is life saving," Darwiche says.
A man who not only has saved lives with Narcan. "I have two recorded Narcan saves." But almost died without it.
"If I didn't have this that I'll be dead. There's no price tag on a human life. And I was personally saved by this more than seven years ago. And imagine, you know, if I wasn't saved by this, then I couldn't have helped so many people, you know, in my in my life," Darwiche says.
Moving forward, the Dearborn Health Department says they'll be collecting data and research based on the usage of the vending machine located here at the John Dingell Transit Center. However, if the research supports it, Abazeed says he expects to add more vending machines full of free Narcan in the near future.