Task force’s work helps Orange County launch a website to help curb the heroin and opioid crisis.

Panel hopes resource clearinghouse will curb opioid crisis

The Friday launch of a website about heroin, opioids and local resources is the most important work that has come from an interagency task force formed a year ago, Orange County Mayor Teresa Jacobs said.

She heralded ocflheroes againstheroin.org, a product of the Orange County Heroin Task Force, during a press conference to debut the site. Jacobs said it’s the first comprehensive resource to which she can direct people in search of assistance.

“I’m the mayor of Orange County and I would have said, ‘I’m not really sure,’” she said. “Too many citizens don’t know where to go to get help. This is going to give them the tools.”

Several task force members stood with the mayor during the presentation. The task force’s work has included helping create a new state law this year that allows for charging traffickers and dealers with murder in overdose deaths.

Central Florida, like much of the country, has been seen a surge in opioid-related deaths in recent years. Nationwide, 33,000 people died from opioids in 2015, the most recent year for which data is available. Nearly 4,000 of those deaths were in Florida and the increase from the year before was higher than all but four states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

More people in Orange County died last year — and so far this year — from overdoses than from violence or vehicle crashes, Capt. Carlos Espinosa of the Orange County Sheriff ’s Office told the public safety coordinating council in a meeting before the press conference.

Many of the drug’s victims are addicts, but others are unaware that traffickers have begun lacing other drugs, including marijuana, with fentanyl, the synthetic opiate analgesic, he said.

Earlier this year, Gov. Rick Scott declared a statewide public health emergency because of the growing crisis and Thursday, President Donald Trump declared a national emergency.

“The best way that we can confront this epidemic is

through education and prevention,” Jacobs said.

The Heroes Against Heroin website, created with graphic designs from University of Central Florida students, provides resources for treatment, prevention and tips for parents. It also shows users how to administer the opioid antidote Naloxone when someone has overdosed.

Orlando Police officers and Orange Sheriff’s Office deputies are equipped with the antidote, also called Narcan, to treat victims and law enforcement personnel after officers here and in other states suffered reactions when exposed to fentanyl on the job. Orlando Police Chief John Mina made carrying Narcan part of the departments protocol.

A state law enacted last year allows the purchase of Narcan without a prescription. The antidote is sold at pharmacies including CVS and Walgreens.

Victims of the opioid crisis in Central Florida have included a 3-month-old infant who overdosed on fentanyl in Kissimmee in July 2016. His mother, Carolina Quiles Sánchez, 26, was recently charged in his death. And in December, three boys ages 5, 2½ and 1½, became orphans after their parents, Daniel and Heather Kelsey, died from the drug on the shoulder of Interstate 4 in Volusia County.

Though most users are in the 22-30 year age range, Espinosa said, an Orange County student advisory committee has launched social media campaigns against the drugs in high schools and middle schools, said Superintendent Barbara Jenkins of Orange County Public Schools.

“We have to attack this issue from all levels,” said Jenkins, who is also on the heroin task force. “Our young people are impacted negatively when adults suffer from addiction and so we are all in on this campaign that the mayor has so ably put in place for our community.”