The West Virginia State Police plans to carry naloxone, a life-saving drug that reverses the effects of opioid overdoses, but there is no time frame for when troopers will begin carrying the drug and it is unclear if any progress has been made since the spring, when the Legislature authorized law enforcement to carry the drug.
In April, Lt. Michael Baylous, spokesman for the State Police, cited cost, training and storage issues as reasons why the state's largest law enforcement agency did not plan on carrying the drug.
"At this point, we do not plan on carrying naloxone because of the uncertainty of all the factors you mentioned," Baylous wrote.
This week, Lawrence Messina, a spokesman for the state Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety, which oversees the State Police, said that they do plan to have troopers carry the drug.
Messina said the initiative is still in the "planning stages" and did not respond to follow- up questions about what needs to be discussed, what progress has been made or when troopers might start carrying the drug.
"The State Police support the governor's initiative and have not ruled out helping to implement it," Messina wrote in an email. "It's a matter of arriving at a practical game plan."
West Virginia leads the nation in per capita drug overdose deaths, with 628 deaths last year, according to preliminary numbers, the vast majority from opioids.
Naloxone blocks or reverses the effects of an opioid overdose. It comes as either an injection or a nasal spray and will work on any narcotic, including heroin and the most commonly abused prescription painkillers.
It has long been used by medical first responders, but began spreading to law enforcement after the passage of a new state law last spring.
Passed unanimously at the request of Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, the law allows both law enforcement and the family and friends of people likely to overdose to carry the drug.
Dr. Rahul Gupta, director of the state Bureau for Public Health, said the increase in availability of naloxone was nothing but a good thing.
In a sign of both the scale of West Virginia's opioid epidemic, and also the potential lives saved by naloxone, Gupta said the drug's use is way up.
Through the middle of October, naloxone has been used 2,505 times by emergency medical responders, not including law enforcement, Gupta said.
That's already well ahead of last year, when the drug was used by EMS personnel 2,171 times during the entire year.
"These are proactive steps to avoid a worsening of the crisis," Gupta said.
Gupta's agency offers training, free of charge, to any law enforcement agency in the state to teach them how to use naloxone. So far, they've trained dozens of officers, who are now able to train others in their departments, Gupta said.
"For law enforcement and other first responders, if there's a need, they want to be trained, they're very much encouraged to contact our office," he said. "It seems to have tremendous benefits."
Other agencies have been quicker to jump on the new opportunity.
Two months ago, the Kanwaha County Sheriff's Office announced that it would supply its officers with Narcan, a trade name for naloxone, becoming the first law enforcement agency in the state to do so.
So far, shift commanders and assistant shift commanders are carrying the drug, Sgt. Brian Humphreys, sheriff's department spokesman, said. Humphreys said there have been no problems with officers carrying naloxone, but that none have had to use it yet.
Two weeks ago, two Charleston Police officers were honored as the first members of that department to use the drug, saving the life of an overdosing man on the city's West Side.
The incident came just a few weeks after the Charleston Fire Department had trained Charleston Police officers in the drug's use.
And last week, the state Board of Education approved a plan to let Brooke County schools stock naloxone, to be administered by a school nurse, if necessary. The board also expressed an interest in allowing schools across the state to keep the medication on hand.
Two weeks ago, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., joined with Sen. Tim Kaine, R-Va., to introduce federal legislation aimed at expanding the use and availability of naloxone. And last month, during his visit to Charleston, President Barack Obama announced initiatives to increase use of the drug, in concert with the private sector.
"It's part of a comprehensive strategy to address the substance abuse epidemic in our state," Gupta said. "It remains a single tool to fight a larger problem."
Reach David Gutman at david.gutman@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-5119 or follow @davidlgutmanon Twitter.