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How a Georgia school is responding to student overdoses
Officials with Gwinnett County Public Schools are responding after three students overdosed on school property. All three cases happened this school year at Berkmar High School.
GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. - Officials with Gwinnett County Public Schools are responding after three students overdosed on school property. All three cases happened during the school year at Berkmar High School.
School officials say this is an issue they have not dealt with before but are tackling head-on.
"Two months ago was the first time I've ever seen an overdose in my 26 years in this profession," said Durrant Williams, the principal of Berkmar High School.
Berkmar High School (FOX 5 Atlanta)
Williams says the three separate incidents involved female students who were around the same grade level.
"We do know that there was a connection of some sort," he said. "They were maybe not best friends, but they were in the same circle."
Officials with the district say months ago they started exploring the option of introducing Narcan training to some of its staff. The nasal spray is a drug that can reverse overdose on opioids like heroin, fentanyl, and oxycodone.
"Every administrator in the district has been required to do the Narcan training. Again, this was about two months ago," said Williams.
It's a decision officials say they are thankful they made, along with providing other resources for students and their families.
"We had been looking at the training and bringing Narcan into the district and researching the benefits of that, and we made the decision prior to any of these issues really happening," said Tinisha Parker, the executive director of student services for the district. "We've partnered with Northside, we've partnered with our Gwinnett, Rockdale, and Newton health center to provide education and lessons for our students on the preventative side, to help them be more aware of the dangers of substances."
Dr. Audrey Arona, the CEO and district medical director for GNR Public Health, says this issue is not unique to Gwinnett County's schools.
"We're seeing more increase in overdoses and overdose deaths this year than we've seen in prior years and we - you know - we kind of expect that," she said. "Fentanyl is a problem. It's a national problem."
She says overdoses are up across all age groups but are drastically up among teens.
"The CDC tells us that overdose deaths in teens have increased more than 94% since 2019," Arona said.
The district says all three students who overdosed are doing OK.