The scene in front of Hartford’s Town Hall on Thursday morning after an overdose victim collapsed on the front lawn. All photos © Eric Francis
WHITE RIVER JUNCTION - When it comes to drug overdoses, there’s never been a summer quite like this in downtown White River Junction.
It’s not an exaggeration to say that Hartford’s emergency services have been responding to at least one reported drug overdose nearly every day for several months running now.
The vast majority of the calls take place in public parks, in the woods that fringe the downtown, and in vehicles; they involve “persons experiencing homelessness,” many of whom are already well known to the police.
Yesterday’s was right on the front lawn of the Hartford Town Hall in broad daylight at 10 a.m.
A passerby flagged down Hartford Police Sgt. Dan Solomita, who’d been patrolling nearby, and pointed to a man named Dustin lying in a crumpled heap next to the apple trees that line the walkway up to the front door.
Within moments a half dozen emergency vehicles—police cruisers, an ambulance, and a fire engine—were racing through town to try to save him. But even though Dustin barely had a pulse when he got the first of two doses of Narcan, he didn’t exactly seem grateful to be revived.
As Dustin walked away police tried offering to take him to speak with various social service agencies, but he declined.
Groggy, unsteady, and clearly annoyed by all the questions about time and date that he was being asked to see if he was alert and oriented, Dustin stated over and over that he didn’t want to get into the ambulance and just wanted to be left alone.
He’d already been taken to the hospital five days earlier, when he’d been the second of two overdoses to go down in the middle of the afternoon in Veterans Park on nearby Railroad Row. Thursday, he wasn’t swayed by the entreaties of the EMTs who were explaining to him yet again that Narcan has a “half-life” and when it wears off in about an hour’s time, fentanyl can return full force from the bloodstream into the brain, suppressing breathing and putting the body right back into a critical overdose state.
“You could die. You could die!” Hartford Fire Captain Will Laliberty repeatedly stressed as Dustin staggered away, muttering obscenities and barely managing a dismissive wave as he headed toward Lyman Point Park, where many other ODs have gone down this summer.
Police tried one last attempt, shouting offers to talk about various social service agencies that were available to help, but moments later Dustin was out of sight.
Last weekend, officers located a man down next to Bridge Street who told them he was “dope sick” but insisted he was not overdosing.
It’s clear the authorities keep hoping that near-death experiences will amount to some sort of life-changing wakeup call for drug users. But it rarely works out that way.
In a now-familiar ritual, first responders work frantically to bring someone back to life— once revived, time and again the victims spend a few minutes in a fog trying to understand what just happened (and perhaps wondering why the friends they just were hanging out with moments before have all scattered and been replaced by a crowd in uniforms)—and then begin the much longer and more difficult task of trying to coax the victim to get into an ambulance and get checked out at the hospital.
In this case, Hartford Police officers and EMTs from the fire department were able to cajole the man into accepting a ride in an ambulance to the hospital.
Yet despite the potential consequences, many addicts who “fall out” and then get revived by Narcan refuse the offer of follow up medical care. On several occasions so far this summer, police and EMTs have been right back on the streets treating the same overdose victim just hours later.
As Thursday’s huddle of emergency vehicles began to break up an ambulance crew member waved goodbye to the group with a cheerful, “See you next one!”
Sgt. Solomita nodded and, thinking aloud, noted, “Now I’ve got to go back to the police station and get more Narcan.”