Indiana

Indiana woman focuses on opioid addiction stigmas after son’s overdose death

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — A woman whose nonprofit was instrumental in passage of a law last year allowing Indiana residents to get a drug that reverses overdoses of opioid drugs is now focusing on stigmas regarding opioid addiction.

The anti-overdose drug, naloxone, more commonly known by its brand name, Narcan, allows people overdosing on heroin or another opioid, such as morphine or oxycodone, to breathe again.

Only first responders and emergency workers were permitted to carry the anti-overdose drug until legislation dubbed Aaron’s Law was signed in April 2015 by Gov. Mike Pence.

The law is named after Justin Phillips’ son Aaron Sims, who died in 2013. The Indianapolis Star reports she is trying to get rid of the stigma that heroin users somehow occupy a lower rung of society than people addicted to prescription opioids.

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