Thank you to Sean Mickey at WKBW News for highlighting MATTERS’ statewide harm reduction services as a resource for individuals and organizations in New York!
Watch the full segment on this page or click on the button below to access WKBW’s article.
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In 2022, over 107,000 people died from an overdose. Many of these fatal overdoses involved fentanyl, a potent synthetic opioid that is frequently found in the drug supply. Earlier this year, xylazine was named an emerging public health threat by the Biden-Harris Administration. Xylazine is an FDA-approved veterinary sedative that is more commonly mixed with fentanyl to lengthen its effects. Medication for Addiction Treatment and Electronic Referrals (MATTERS) has distributed over 2 MILLION fentanyl and xylazine test strips to individuals and organizations across New York State.
This test strip distribution program was initially launched in August of 2022. Thanks to the education and advocacy efforts from the New York State Office of Addiction Services and Supports (OASAS), more orders have been coming in than ever before.
“Our orders went from 20 or 30 a day to at least a couple hundred, sometimes thousands in a day that we’re receiving,” said Mia Dickinson, harm reduction specialist for MATTERS. Mia told WKBW that test strips are an effective strategy to reduce the risk of an overdose.
She said the test strips are an effective strategy to reduce the risk of overdose: “So they can test their supply for these certain contaminants and avoid overdoses or other negative consequences associated with fentanyl and xylazine.”
