Death of aide makes drug talk personal

Gov. John Kasich knows on a personal level the deadly price extracted by drugs — and the pain that follows.

Fond of invoking faith and values as one of multiple routes to blunting Ohio’s deadly opioid crisis, Kasich

addressed about 200 faith leaders Thursday afternoon at Vineyard Columbus church.

And the governor brought up a matter he previously had declined to discuss: the death of a young member of his staff from a cocaine and fentanyl overdose.

Though not mentioning 23-year-old Ryan Dupain by name, Kasich talked about his death, apparently for the first time in public, while discussing what churches and the clergy can do to help rescue the addicted and divert wouldbe addicts.

The governor said he had a meeting with about 15 young staff members following the June 4 death of Dupain, an advance man for Kasich’s 2016 presidential campaign who then became a legislative lobbyist with a state agency.

“This happened too soon. It’s time to grow up,” Kasich said he told his staff members.

During later remarks, Kasich said the church — not government — is best positioned to instill religious faith and values to help steer people away from the temptation of drugs when they face despair.

Rich Nathan, senior pastor of Vineyard Columbus, sat next to Kasich to discuss the opioid crisis that accounted for most of Ohio’s 4,050 drug-overdose deaths last year, an increase of 33 percent.

“This is an all-handson-deck moment,” he said, suggesting clergy members should encourage parishioners “to actually meet real people ... and hear their stories” in a bid to assist them with drug addiction and other problems rather than simply talking about it.

Kasich pointed to stringent new limits on pain-pill prescriptions, the closing of pill mills and a stalemate in deaths caused by heroin and painkillers.

“If it wasn’t for fentanyl, we’re seeing real success ... you take it and you’re dead,” he said.

Though heroin deaths leveled off in 2016, fentanyl — the deadly synthetic opioid that’s 50 times stronger than heroin — shot up to account for 58.2 percent of deaths, up from 37.9 percent in 2015.

Kasich also said law enforcement continues to play an important role, praising the State Highway Patrol for its emphasis on drug-interdiction efforts.

So far this year, troopers have seized 61 pounds of the much-cheaper-tomake fentanyl, more than eight times as much as was seized last year, according to patrol statistics. Recent seizures have included more than 6 pounds in one traffic stop and nearly 26 pounds in another, both in the Dayton area.

Though opioids are still being shipped into Ohio, the amounts being seized by troopers are beginning to dwindle. Drug cartels increasingly have turned to manufacturing and peddling methamphetamine, particularly in liquid form, said Department of Public Safety Director John Born.

Born expressed alarm by one number that demonstrates the depth of the opioid crisis and lives yanked back from the brink of death.

Paramedics and EMTs have administered 39,920 does of Naloxone, a drug used to revive opioid overdose victims, so far this year, an increase of 25 percent from all of 2016 and double the number of doses administered in 2015.