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05/31/2023 07:53 AMWhile the State of Connecticut no longer recognizes COVID-19 as a public health emergency, that doesn’t mean people should be nonchalant about what remains the third leading cause of death in the United States. Nor should they not care about any other major public health issues that are affecting their neighbors, says Barbara Naclerio.
Barbara is a public health educator with the East Shore District Health Department and helps to survey the state of the mental and physical health of East Haven, Branford, and North Branford residents.
One of those major health issues includes the startling high levels of overdoses and deaths from opioid drugs. Providing education and support on the matter and for those who are in the throes of addiction is something with which Barbara is involved.
“One of the newer projects we’re working on is addressing drug overdoses. Our emergency people, fire, and police, are spending a lot of time going out and saving people or seeing people die of drug overdoses,” Barbara says.
She says that both East Haven and Branford have suffered from a high number of opioid-caused deaths, with the primary chemical culprit being the highly potent fentanyl.
“It’s 100 times more potent than morphine,” she says.
In the previous eight years, the prevalence of drugs like opioids, combined with their high potency, has caused an increase in overdose deaths amongst the district’s adults, according to Barbara. She says most of those cases were observed with adults between the ages of 35 to 65, with 75% of whom were male.
Wondering where the district could fit into this crisis, Barbara has formed multiple groups to address its drivers and provide resources. One of those groups included the public safety services of the district’s area of coverage, their mental health provider BHCare, Branford Counseling & Community Services, to discuss what they have witnessed among community members in relation to opioid abuse. This is part of Barbara’s role as an educator with the district, which is to find ways to address public health crises through collaborative means and provide the necessary treatment resources. She relates this mission to another team she mustered.
“I have a group called the Community Health Improvement Planning Board, or the CHIP board, and we have been around since 2015. We address different things in the community.”
There are several individual stakeholders in CHIP, from people at Fair Haven Community Health, medical professionals at Yale University, and those who work for their municipalities. This also includes library personnel at Edward Smith and Hagaman Memorial libraries.
“You would be shocked like how well you can get information out for the public through libraries…there’s so many different populations that use the libraries, and it’s just amazing how fast you can get information out to people,” says Barbara.
Looking to promote health and wellness this summer, the district’s Community Health Improvement Planning Board will be hosting educational talks on Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) at the libraries in its region.
“Childhood experiences, both positive and negative, have a tremendous impact on future violence victimization and perpetration, and lifelong health and opportunity. As such, early experiences are an important public health issue,” says Barbara.
Barbara added that attendees to these talks will learn about the potential negative outcomes of ACEs and how “the wide-ranging health and social consequences of ACEs underscore the importance of preventing them before they happen.”
Barbara says the topic of harm reduction for drug users is going to be another big focus for the district this summer. Communication and education on harm reduction response and tactics by the district is looking to continuously be spread throughout its served communities throughout the upcoming season.
“Our basic thing is to go around to the community and talk about drug addiction and what it really is… and get them to understand that we want to provide Narcan to people so that if they’re friends, or families, or users that they have them in case this happens.
One of the key points to be made in these talks is to strip away the stigma against people struggling with drug addictions and recognize their personhood. She says it would be unfair to disregard those who are seriously struggling, especially since they do not have the physiological capacity to help themselves most of the time.
“People may choose that first time or the second time to take drugs. But after that, their brain has changed, and they never feel normal again. Does that mean give up on them and let them die? Or [should we] think they don’t deserve a life? Because the treatments out there are medications and can help them get back to feeling somewhat normal even if they have to take them for the rest of their lives. It’s a way that they can get back to feeling valued in the community,” says Barbara. “It’s all about having purpose when you wake up in the morning.”
The educational talks on ACEs will be hosted at Hagaman Memorial Library in East Haven, James Blackstone Memorial, and Willoughby Wallace Memorial libraries in Branford, Atwater Memorial Library in North Branford, and Edward Smith Library in Northford. Edward Smith Library will host the first talk on June 7 at 6:30 p.m.
For more information on the district and its public health resources, visit. www.esdhd.org.