Amid Rising Overdoses, Nonprofit Distributes Fentanyl Test Strips To Dozens Of Bay Area Bars
OAKLAND (KPIX 5) – The headlines and sad statistics are out there of accidental overdoses of fentanyl shattering families and cutting lives too short.
In the past few weeks, three people in San Francisco died due to overdoses when they didn't know they were ingesting fentanyl.
One Bay Area nonprofit is looking to make it easy for recreational drug users to test and see if they are about to ingest something potentially deadly. FentCheck spends a dollar a piece on fentanyl test strips and distributes them to bars, art galleries and tattoo parlors in the hopes of slowing the overdose crisis, even a little.
"We see fentanyl in of course, heroin — but it's not a heroin problem anymore, it's cocaine, it's ketamine, it's Molly. It's Xanax. Pressed pills are very easy to manufacture and unless you are getting it from a pharmacy, you really should test every single time," said co-founder of FentCheck Alison Heller.
"People are still going to do drugs. The reality is that 100% of people who die don't make it too rehab. We just want to make sure people survive the night," Heller told KPIX 5.
Just like the jars of condoms that emerged in bathrooms during the AIDS crisis, inside Temescal Brewing's bathroom are jars of fentanyl test strips.
Heller wanted to make sure that testing was available in places where people might be using or thinking about using.
"What really moved us to do this is that a member of our staff had a close, a close associate who did lose their life to an overdose. That was really — one of a thousand stories — but something that did really spur some action amongst us," brewery owner Sam Gilbert told KPIX 5.
The strips take just 5 minutes, 15 seconds to reveal whether or not a drug like cocaine or Molly has traces of fentanyl.
FentCheck co-founder Dean Shold, who is also chief technology officer of the Alameda Health System, said the strips are as easy as using a COVID-19 at home test kit.
"We are going to pretend this is a little baggie of cocaine and we are going to put a very small amount into the solution we have," Shold demonstrated to KPIX 5. Then you dip the strip into the solution for 15 seconds, then wait.
"If that line is there — two lines — two thumbs up there is no fentanyl in that solution," he explained
The group calls the 40 bars it works with in the Bay Area every other day to see if they need more strips.
"FentCheck is coming by and re-stock twice a week at this point. We see a lot of people picking up our test strips," Gilbert told KPIX5.