MLB is hosting a large fentanyl awareness nonprofit at events related to its All-Star Game on Tuesday.
Song For Charlie (SFC) was invited by the league to install a booth with interactive displays at the Capital One All-Star Village in Arlington, Texas, during All-Star Week.
“Participation in Song for Charlie is a high-profile national event that validates the importance of educating the public about the risks of fentapills. At this stage of the fentanyl awareness movement, more families have heard about the problem, which is good news. The next step is to deepen their knowledge and provide practical tools and strategies they can use to stay safe,” said Ed Ternan, who founded SFC with his wife Mary after their 22-year-old son Charlie died from taking counterfeit pills in 2020.
“Our interactive displays and features are designed to make families comfortable with what we call The New Drug Talk or La Nueva Drug Talk. We can’t think of a better place to engage children and parents in a positive environment, inviting them to help us spread our life-saving message.”
Ternan’s approach to fentanyl is educational rather than punitive, focusing on obtaining information about the drug’s dangers for young people.
He told The Hill that fentanyl is increasing death rates among two types of people: longtime opioid users at risk because fentanyl has replaced many plant-based opioids on the street, and users of other drugs who may encounter narcotics mixed with fentanyl. .
“So long-time opioid users who are further along in their drug use journey really have no choice but to use fentanyl because that’s all they can get. And it’s so potent that it’s impossible to dose accurately. Over time, sooner or later, you will make a mistake and die. So people who have been addicted to opioids for a long time and who use opioids are dying in record numbers,” Ternan said.
The SFC focuses on the second group, trying to ensure that more young people and their families understand the increased risk that fentanyl adds to illicit drugs.
“When we focus on young people, it’s more of a lack of information that they don’t understand the risk and that fentanyl is present in these counterfeit pills, but is also increasingly found in cocaine. And so they are dying because of a lack of information and awareness of how dangerous this is,” Ternan said.
According toCenters for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),102,384 drug deaths were reported in the United States in the 12 months ending in January 2024, a drop from the peak of 111,170 deaths reported in the 12 months ending in May 2023, but still double the rate from a decade ago when the Fentanyl began to replace other black market opioids.
And fentanyl is affecting a wider swath of the US population than the prescription opioid pill crisis.
According to a report published in March by the American Journal of Epidemiology, Hispanic drug overdose death rates in 2011 were 0.14 per 100,000 people, far below the 0.49 per 100,000 white people. In 2019, that rate rose to 1.16 per 100,000, compared to 1.39 per 100,000 for white Americans.
In May, for Fentanyl Awareness Day, SFC expanded its “The New Drug Talk” campaign with “La Nueva Drug Talk,” a culturally competent version targeting Latino youth and their parents with information about fentanyl.
“What we really understood was that there was a reluctance to talk to your kids in the Latino community, that there is this stigma about drugs and having these conversations at the dinner table,” said Renee Cuevas, a member of the SFC Latinx advisory team. .
SFC will have resources for both campaigns, including fentanyl experts and grieving family members sharing first-person perspectives at its All-Star booth, sponsored by Walmart and Meta.
“The All-Star Game celebrates the best in our sport and also provides a national platform to highlight causes that are important to Major League Baseball. We applaud the excellent work done by Song for Charlie in the fight against fentanyl. MLB is proud to host Song for Charlie at our Midsummer Classic in Texas, which will raise awareness and educate young people about this vital issue,” said Jon Coyles, MLB Vice President of Medication, Health and Safety Programs.
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
