July 14, 2021 • 55 mins
Dave Humes is a Board Member and the Public Policy Coordinator of aTAcK addiction, a naloxone trainer, and co-chair of the Changing Perceptions and Stigma Subcommittee of the Behavioral Health Consortium In Delaware. Dave shares his story of losing his son to an opioid overdose, and how that inspired him to advocate for policy change surrounding access to naloxone (an opioid overdose-reversal medication) in Delaware. Valerie and Carly ask Dave for advice about advocating for policy change and Dave shares advice for scientists.
Learn more about aTAcK addiction here: https://www.attackaddiction.org/
Follow Dave on Twitter: @Gregs_Dad
Learn more about how naloxone laws changed between 2001 and 2017 through the Prescription Drug Policy System site: https://pdaps.org/
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Valerie Earnshaw (00:11):
I'm Valerie Earnshaw.
Carly Hill (00:13):
I'm Carly Hill,
Valerie Earnshaw (00:14):
And this is sex drugs and science.
Carly Hill (00:17):
Today's conversation is with Dave Humes, who is a
board member of attackaddiction, a local advocacy
group, focused on addiction herein Delaware.
He's a Naloxone trainer, amember of the drug overdose
fatality review commission, andthe co-chair of the Changing
Perceptions and Stigmasubcommittee of the behavioral
health consortium in Delaware.
Valerie Earnshaw (00:36):
Uh, Carly, I haven't told Dave this, but I
have a lot of affection for himbecause he reminds me of like
all of my uncles.
I feel like I could count onDave to tell dad jokes at a
picnic or meet me on, you know,95 or a local highway if my car
broke down.
So I don't know.
Am I off base?
Carly Hill (00:55):
No, I think Dave is way cooler! I wish Dave was my
uncle actually.
Valerie Earnshaw (00:59):
But then unlike my uncles, Steve spends
his days distributing Naloxoneall over our state, which is a
medication that can reverseopioid overdoses and he has this
like, you know, little interestin supervised consumption sites
as a form of harm reductions,which is still like mega
controversial.
There are places where peoplecan use drugs under supervision
(01:22):
of medical professionals andthere, you know, another
strategy to prevent overdosestats.
David's done a lot of work inDelaware and other states to get
Naloxone policies passed.
And now he's kind of turning toother policies to address the
opioid crisis and reduceoverdose rates.
So we were really interested ingetting to know Dave story and
(01:42):
continuing our conversation thissummer about the intersection of
science and policy with him.
So please enjoy thisconversation with uncle Dave
Humes, Dave Humes, welcome tothe podcast.
Thanks for joining us.
Dave Humes (02:03):
Thank you, Carly.
Thank you, Valerie.
Thrilled to be here, to talk toyou about some really important
issues.
Valerie Earnshaw (02:09):
So we have a lot of folks who aren't from
Delaware, who listen so for thepeople who aren't Delaware.
I just want them to know thatwe're chatting today with like a
local superhero celebrity,especially in the area of--
Dave Humes (02:22):
hardly.
Valerie Earnshaw (02:24):
made a lot of good changes in our local opioid
crisis.
So, so Dave, for the folks whohaven't had the benefit of
attending one of your Naloxonetrainings or reading about you
in the paper, which Carly and Ihave both done both.
Tell us a little bit just aboutyour background and how you got
involved in some of these issuessurrounding the opioid crisis
(02:45):
and recovery in Delaware.
Dave Humes (02:47):
Absolutely I said it many times in public meetings.
I like to steal a good quotewhen I can find one.
And I like to start out, youknow, to tell the listeners with
a quote,"never doubt that asmall group of thoughtful,
concerned citizens can changethe world".
Indeed.
It's the only thing that everhas.
And as we talk today, I hopethat your listeners will keep in
(03:09):
mind.
I'm really nobody special.
I'm just a dad.
And when I talk about our, ournonprofit organization Attack
Addiction, I jokingly say we'rejust a bunch of dumb moms and
dads trying to figure it outbecause we're not professionals
at what we do, but you know, wetry and find a way to get things
done.
So I'm a person in long-termrecovery from alcohol and
(03:32):
illegal drugs.
I am not somebody who ever usedheroin.
And I don't say that because Iwould be embarrassed to say so I
say that because I think it's adifferent type of addiction, a
stronger type of addiction thanall these other addictions.
If we go back to Philip SeymourHoffman, he's somebody who had
(03:53):
been addicted to heroin had 20years of sobriety and something
drew him back and he overdosedand died.
So again, I've been in recoveryfor a long time, but the thing
that got me involved is I hadtwo sons who were a year apart
and they did absolutelyeverything together.
They were playing sports teamstogether.
(04:14):
They, they liked the same musicand bands and went to concerts
together and everything.
And then my younger son, Greg,he started doing what people do
as teenagers.
You know, they are wired toexperiment, to push limits, push
boundaries and whatnot.
And, but both my boys, you know,did a little experimentation.
They, you know, they, they weredoing mushrooms and they were
(04:35):
smoking some weed and that sortof thing.
And, but my son, Greg kept goingand he started using other
things such as cocaine, which isinteresting because at the time
we tried to get him into a rehaband they said, uh, you know, we
can't take him because cocaineisn't addictive.
Once it's out of your system,it's all gone.
(04:55):
You know, if you had a problemwith alcohol.
So we said, oh yeah, we forgotabout the alcohol problem.
Just to get them into some sortof treatment.
That's the way things were.
And then it-- this goes backinto about 2006, 2007, somewhere
in there, you know?
So anyhow, you know, his useprogressed and he started using
heroin.
He was introduced to heroin,started smoking a little bit.
(05:19):
And finally he ran into a ladyfriend and it's not her fault,
but she introduced him toinjecting and whatnot and to
feed his habit, he got involvedin some things he shouldn't have
gotten involved in and ended upgoing to prison.
And when I, what I have to telleverybody about Greg, is anybody
who ever met him would describehim with one word.
(05:41):
And that was sweet.
You know, oftentimes we think ofpeople who get addicted to these
substances as being, you know,risk takers and whatnot.
And what we found out along thisjourney, some of the other
parents that have been involvedas it's typically people who
feel as if they don't fit in,who are quiet, more sensitive
and whatnot.
(06:01):
And that's why they turn todifferent drugs.
So, Greg was really a sweet kid.
He really was.
And you know, here's somebodygoing to prison and they go,
well, that doesn't sound sosweet to me, you know, but in
effect it was, he served 21months in prison.
And when he was released, youknow, we had the talks of course
about, you know, not startingrelationships and that sort of
(06:23):
thing.
Uh, you know, get yourselfstraight before you do that.
Then, you know, he started arelationship and he, uh, ended
up violating his parole and hewent back to prison.
His second stint in prison, itwas, it was Rocky between he and
I at first because he violatedshortly before Christmas, you
know, I was angry.
And even though I knew aboutaddiction or thought I knew
(06:46):
about addiction, I still didn'tknow enough to understand about
heroin and whatnot.
So we, we were, you know, wewere on icy terms at the time
and they cooled, certainly,because again, the only thing
you can really do is give yourlove and support to try to get
them back on the right path.
And it was while he was doinghis second stint in prison.
(07:08):
And he said, you know, I,"Icoasted the first time around
and he said, but I don't want tospend my life institutionalized,
whether it be rehabilitation orcorrectional facilities".
And he really got it at thattime.
He was in prison inPennsylvania.
He got released on parole to mywife and I, we had his parole
(07:29):
transferred here to Delaware.
Originally I'm originally fromPennsylvania and he was doing
absolutely everything right inhis life.
He was exercising.
He was very engaged with my wifeand I.
He wasn't, you know, he wasn'tupstairs on the computer or on
his phone, you know, we'd watchsporting events together.
And, and he, you know, he wasjust very engaged with us.
(07:50):
He'd go to bed early, get upearly in the morning, do
meditation, do some exercising.
He was getting ready toparticipate in one of those mud
runs for MS.
Valerie Earnshaw (08:00):
Yeah! Like many early 20 year olds.
Dave Humes (08:07):
He was completing his community service at the
food bank of Delaware andwhatnot.
And he was doing everythingabsolutely right in his life.
And he was gradually gettingtogether with his old friends,
because some people like toportray opioid addiction, heroin
addiction, as a party drug, andnothing could be further from
the truth.
It's a drug of shame.
And so it distances you from thegood people in your life it
(08:30):
distanced him from his brotherwho was so very close, but he
was starting to get togetheragain with the people who were
the good guys in his life andgetting reacclimated to
normalizing his life.
And we had conversations aboutdifferent things.
He was working for me at thetime in a small business.
He had a great aptitude for it.
We spent a lot of hours in thecar going to job sites, driving
(08:53):
up to north Jersey and Virginiaand that sort of thing, and
talking about some things.
And one of the things I had saidto him was that I really felt
that he should quit drinking aswell, because he had never, you
know, apparently had a problem,a drinking problem.
But I thought I said to him, Isaid, you know, my fear is that
some night you'll drink too muchand clouds your judgment.
You'll say, now I can do thisagain.
(09:13):
And then you'll be off andrunning again.
And what happened as he wasreacclimating himself, he was
out with some friends.
That I knew that were the goodguys in his life.
And he bumped into some oldrunning mates of his and, uh,
you know clouded judgment.
And he thought he could go outand do this one more time.
And you know, when you, whenyou're away from opioids for
(09:34):
awhile, you have a change intolerance.
And he tried to use what he hadused before.
And that decision proved to befatal.
And the people he was with, theylifted him up.
They put them in his car.
They drove him to the parkinglot of a hospital and they
simply walk away.
They did not, they did not go tothe emergency room doors and
(09:55):
punch on that red button and runlike crazy.
They didn't hit the key fob toget the horn beeping and run
away.
They didn't go a block away andtry to call and say,"Hey, go
look in parking lot." They just,they just left them there.
And by the time they discoveredhim, it was too late.
They rushed him in and theytried to revive him, but he had
been there too long.
(10:15):
And in the aftermath I met withthe investigating detective two
days later, after, as a matterof fact, two days from now,
Wednesday will mark, the ninthyear, since he's been gone to
the day.
But two days later, I met withthe investigating detective to
reclaim his belongings, his carand that sort of thing.
And the detective said to me,you know, if we had a 911 good
(10:38):
Samaritan Law, or a Narcan Law,your son might very well be
alive today.
Valerie Earnshaw (10:42):
Oh okay.
Dave Humes (10:42):
And those were the words that stuck with me, I was
trying to decide what I wasgoing to do.
I had a small business at thetime, and I talked to some
people who advise mefinancially.
If somebody says, they own abusiness, you know, they got an
expensive car and everything.
It was a small business.
Let me tell you.
We have a nice little townhouse,but again, nothing special.
(11:06):
But I talked to some financialpeople and they said, you guys
don't live high on the hog.
You know, if, if you want toretire, now you can probably do
it.
So the goal was really to try todo something about this whole
crisis at the time.
And I made the decision to closedown my business and people said
to me,"you dummy, why didn't yousell it?" And I didn't show it
(11:30):
because I didn't want to beinvolved in it anymore.
And I knew I would have had tosign a contract, you know, for
consulting for a number ofperiods.
I decided really just to closeit down because most of the
business was in my head, 90% ofit.
So it took some time to close itdown.
I wanted to make sure, you know,I did things right.
Didn't leave anybody out,hanging out there.
Then that took me to October of2012.
(11:53):
And you know, I was ready tosort of jump into the fight, but
Thanksgiving was coming up and Iknew the first Thanksgiving
would be extremely hard.
It's always been my favoriteholiday.
You know, just immediate family,no presents, no cards, all that
stuff.
It's just family gatherings.
And I said, I, I, you know, Ibetter hold off, which I did.
And during the course of closingdown my business, the end of
(12:16):
September, prior to being closeddown, the local newspaper had a
front page story on heroin.
And I read that article and Ifolded it up and I put it in the
corner of my desk.
And I said, I'm going to getback to this.
So in January of 2013, January2nd, probably it was, I picked
up that newspaper.
(12:36):
I read through it, anybody whowas quoted in there, I reached
out and I contacted.
And I was really fortunatebecause one of the people that
had led me to the doorstep ofGenie and Don Keester, who had
started an organization here inDelaware called attack
addiction.
They had lost their son onDecember 23rd, 2012.
(12:57):
You know, you think about that.
If that's not bad enough, it wasworse for them because it was
also their daughter's birthday.
That's what she has to live within that time of year, every
year.
And then they started thisorganization within two months
of the loss of their son, Tyler.
And they started theorganization, not as a support
group, but as an opentransparent action group, we
(13:21):
were determined to do something.
My Vow, after losing Greg, likevow to him, was to somehow save
a life in his name.
And I didn't care if I knew thatperson's name, I didn't care if
they knew Greg's or my name.
But the idea was to somehow savea life in his name.
(13:42):
Of course, it's like, well, howdo you do this?
Valerie Earnshaw (13:45):
Sure.
Dave Humes (13:45):
So what we decided to do at Attack Addiction was
well we said, okay, what do wedo?
I brought up that quote from thedetective.
"If we had a 9 1, 1 or a goodSamaritan law.
Some might very well be alivetoday" when we decided that
would be a good idea at the timewe were a small group.
And the decision was whether wetried to get a bill passed with
(14:05):
both of those things in there,or whether just go for one.
And if we were just going to tryfor one how to go about it,
which one should we select?
Valerie Earnshaw (14:15):
Oh, this is, let me put a pause here because
I have a million questions foryou.
And I'm so excited because, youknow, to hear about the, you
know, how you started workingtowards the, making these
changes in the bills, but youstarted out.
So first off, I just want to saythat you started the story by
saying that, you know, you'renobody special and I've just
(14:39):
have got to disagree, you know,because as you're telling this
story and I just, I want to saya huge thanks to you for sharing
it, both, you know, here andCarly and I have heard you share
it in other places as well.
And I don't know what theexperience of sharing that story
is, but the experience for me ofhearing your story, like every
(15:01):
time I'm, teary-eyed, every timeI'm, I'm super moved and it's
such a powerful, it's a powerfulstory and it's, it must be hard
to share it, but it's also sucha gift for allowing people to
hear more about the experienceas you go along and tell it
you're, you're bustingstereotypes left and right.
(15:22):
Like it's really amazing.
And you're also underscoringsome big problems, like, you
know, something that jumped outto me on this one, just was
that, you know, we've had a fewconversations now around how we
take a criminal justice approachrather than a public health
approach towards addiction.
And in this story, like, why isit that Greg landed in jail
(15:47):
twice or, you know, circulatesthrough prison, but he doesn't
get care?
Like you took him to care and hedidn't get care.
We talked last summer with apediatrician, Scott Hanlon, who,
who really highlighted for us,how we're lacking in treatment
for young people.
And so that's one thing thatruns through my mind with this,
but I also just, like, Ipersonally resonate quite a bit
(16:10):
with your story in terms of,well, first off I was born in
Pennsylvania, moved to Delaware.
So we both have that same, youknow, migration pattern..
Dave Humes (16:20):
We have that Commonwealth of knowledge.
Carly Hill (16:27):
*ba dum tss*
Valerie Earnshaw (16:27):
We have similar humor a pparently.
And then I can also relate tojust like getting really bad.
Our family got really bad advicein the 2000's about addiction,
you know, and about y eah.
How to respond to it.
And you know, what treatmentoptions were available to us, we
also have lost, you know, afamily member to overdose.
(16:49):
And so then I have to push backon you about this, like nothing
special piece.
I mean, in some ways, you know,many families have lost people
to addiction.
Many fathers have lost sons tooverdose and not all of them
have, you know, retired earlyand really thrown themselves
(17:09):
into this movement.
And it's amazing that youconnected with another family,
you know, you connected with theKeesters early on and found some
folks were also doing that, butthat's the only part of your
story that I have to disagreewith and push b ack o n.
Carly Hill (17:23):
Well, that, and I was just gonna say, Dave, you've
also, you know, saved more than,than one life for Greg too.
I know that through your workwith the Naloxone training and
all that.
So I have to agree that I thinkyou were pretty wrong about the
nothing special thing, butcontinue,
Dave Humes (17:38):
You know, I, I say that because I want people to
realize that they can step upand do this.
Really.
You know, if you step up, youcan make these changes
certainly.
And you, it's interesting aboutsaving a life it's...
I wanted to save a life and thenI got greedy, not enough.
Valerie Earnshaw (18:00):
Best place to be greedy in!
Dave Humes (18:01):
T hat, yeah.
Yeah, y eah.
And one of those saved throughthis w ork was my cousin,
Valerie Earnshaw (18:07):
oh my God,
Dave Humes (18:08):
I got a call from one of my cousins and said, you
saved your cousin's life.
I said, what are you talkingabout?
And he said, the overdosed, theycalled 911, they administered
Naloxone and he's alive.
You know?
So you hear that and you know ithits you certainly, it really
hits you.
Valerie Earnshaw (18:25):
All right.
Well, let's return the wheel toyou.
You got us up to the part of thestory where you've gotten
together with the Keesters, youhave formed to talk addiction,
you're a board member of AttackAddiction, which is fantastic.
And you're making a decisionabout whether to pursue just the
Narcan access laws or the goodSamaritan or both in
(18:46):
combination.
So could you, could you catch upfolks who may not be familiar
with Narcan?
I know you're very familiar witht his.
If you catch them u p j ust t owhat that...
Dave Humes (18:57):
So just very briefly about good Samaritan because
that leads to the Naloxone.
So our decision was to try toget a law, a 911 good Samaritan
law, which would allow people tocall 911 without being arrested,
charged, or prosecuted, both theperson who made the call and the
person who was in medicaldistress.
So it seemed to us,"that's agood idea.
(19:18):
It doesn't cost the state anymoney, how can they object to
that?" So that was really ourstrategy.
But even to get there before youget to the 911 good Samaritan
law, we have to go to the samesex marriage act.
Because again, we were just abunch of dumb moms and dads
like, well,"how do you pass alaw?" We know basically how to
(19:41):
pass a law, but what's theactual process?
What do you have to go through?
So at the same time in 2013,Delaware was looking at passing,
changing the law to allow samesex marriage that had been
worked on from early on duringthe legislative session and
actually passed through itsfinal step at the end of April
(20:02):
or early May of that year.
So what we did is as a strategy,we looked at that bill and we
looked at the members of theSenate, how they voted.
We looked at the members of thehouse as they voted.
And the people who were in favorof that bill, we thought would
be sympathetic to our cause ofthe 911 good Samaritan law.
And we thought we may have to dosome further education to those
(20:25):
who had voted against the samesex.
So we took sort of a two-prongedapproach and, you know, we shot
to educate them as to why theyshould pass that bill.
So, you know, ultimately we weresuccessful passing it, the same
sex marriage bill was a littlebit over 50% vote in favor of it
to pass that bill, both in thehouse and the Senate here in
(20:46):
Delaware.
And when we, it was just, it wasso moving when we passed the
good Samaritan bill, because inthe Senate, we passed it
unanimously.
And then the house we did thesame, there were three members
who weren't present to vote, butJewish, just really a very
moving thing.
So following the same sexmarriage path into the 911 Good
Samaritan bill, you know, led usto say, okay, we've done this.
(21:09):
We've sorta learned how to gothrough this.
Now we can try to get theNaloxone bill passed.
So we, we used much of the samestrategy that we had used before
with the good Samaritan bill.
And, you know, we, we found achampion and a sponsor.
We actually had, uh, a billwritten up by a lawyer that was
(21:29):
specific to Delaware.
And they said,"Eh do you want itsort of tight, or you want it
really broad?" We said,"make itas broad as possible!" We can
get it through broad, that'sgreat.
You know, if we have to makesome concessions along the lines
, you know, so be it.
So anyhow, that was thefollowing year in 2014.
And again, we use that samestrategy.
We had our organization by thattime was growing.
(21:51):
We asked all of our members, wethought we were geniuses at the
time.
We're not the only ones shoulddo this.
We asked each of our members, wegave them some talking points.
And what we asked them to do isput together an email to their
own representatives.
The first thing they want to sayin that is they're a constituent
and a registered voter in thereand tell them why they were in
(22:11):
favor of this bill.
And we told them what we alsowanted them to do is reach out
to five other people and askthem to do the same, reach out,
to-- have them reach out to fivemore.
Through some of our studies andwhatnot, it was our
understanding that when youcontact one of your state
representatives, electedofficials, that each contact
(22:33):
represents about a hundredpeople.
So you have to go wow on that.
"Never thought of that.
I just thought I was just somedumb guy" you know, state
Senator or whatever, you know,so, you know, it really has an
impact.
You know, we used, we puttogether a fact sheet about
Naloxone and we told them, youknow, it was FDA approved in
(22:53):
1971.
It had no, you know, it couldnot be abused in any way, shape
or form.
Like some of the MAT could, youknow, it was innert, it only
affected opioids and didn'taffect anything else.
So if you gave it to somebodywho was not in an opioid
overdose, it would not helpthem, but it would not harm
them.
So we had this fact sheet thatwe made sure we send out to them
(23:16):
to help pass the bill.
And we were successful passingthat one as well.
We also sorta jumped in on withone of our representatives who
were supportive.
And at the same time, they had abill that would allow all
departments of peace officers inthe state of Delaware to be
trained in carrying Naloxone,local police couldn't just say
(23:38):
at the time"we're going to carryNaloxone because it's going to
save lives." You know, alldepartments had to be allowed to
do it under Delaware law them tobe able to do it.
So that bill was also passed,you know, at that same point in
time.
So we have been involved andwritten the initial bill of
anything, having to do withNaloxone in our state.
So we've had several bills afterthat, that have been passed.
(24:01):
We have one right now thatawaits the governor's signature,
we found out in Delaware, wehave a behavioral health
consortium that addresses mentalhealth and addiction issues.
And we have a subcommittee onchanging perceptions and stigma.
And as a result of our work onthat committee, we found out
that our original Naloxone billdid not grant immunity from
(24:23):
liability for lay peopleadministering it.
So right now that passed bothhouses pretty readily.
And we're just waiting to findout when the governor's going to
sign that one.
Carly Hill (24:34):
Can you tell our listeners a little bit more,
when you say about the liabilityof administering Naloxone, can
you tell us a little bit aboutthat?
Dave Humes (24:41):
Well, some of the bills that have been passed
along the way and gave, you know, police officers liability from
being sued formis-administration of Naloxone.
And it was a very importantthing for them to have that some
of those, those issues to me,it's like this can't hurt
anybody.
How can you mis-administer?
You know, we look to try to findinstances of where there had
(25:04):
been allergic reactions oranything.
And to this day, I haven't foundone.
I can't tell you, I spent, youknow, 24 hours a day, day, you
know, throughout the yearlooking for it, but we haven't
been able to find that, but itcame as a result because in our
work with the subcommittee fromthe consortium, we went to some
trade groups and said, you know,we were talking to them about
(25:25):
their hiring policies for peoplewho had had convictions for
illegal drugs, what theirpolicies were on treatment.
If they discovered somebody whowas in use and the end of the
one meeting, I said, oh, by theway, if you ever want to have
your folks trained out in thefield, do use Naloxone.
We're happy to do it because weknow people in recovery
gravitate toward theconstruction industry, to the
(25:46):
restaurant industry and whatnot.
And what we found out from thatwas that the companies, the
construction companies, therestaurants and whatnot, they
were in favor of it, but theysaid that their insurers were
against it because they fearedliability.
And again, it's, you know, it'sa matter of people not
understanding that there's verylittle harm, you know, that you
(26:08):
can receive from Naloxone andwhatnot.
So, you know, we talked to theinsurance department, insurance
departments at timeout, andthat's a legal issue.
Go talk to the department ofjustice.
So we got in touch with thedepartment of justice and they
said, you know, actually thatoriginal bill does not have that
liability protection in it.
So you'd probably need a bill.
So it was okay that you puttogether a bill and again, so
we're just awaiting a signatureon that.
(26:29):
Right now, we still needadditional protection against
liabilities because thecompanies themselves would like
it.
And we get pushback from someorganizations when it comes to
immunity.
So we have to be careful withlanguage we have to try to, you
know, put out a bill, that'sgoing to be palatable to some of
these organizations who areagainst it for various reasons.
Valerie Earnshaw (26:50):
I'm so impressed, Dave, that this is
already awaiting a signature.
I feel like, I mean, maybeyou've been-- hearing you talk
about this liability issue,maybe you've been talking about
it for longer than I'm aware of,but I feel like it was only a
couple months ago where you, Iwas at one of these subcommittee
meetings and you're like, oh,"we've figured out that this
(27:11):
liability thing is a barrier topeople wanting to get trained
and to using Narcan." And so youwere like,"we're going to try
and change it", you know?
And to me not, you know, it justfeels like, you know, fast
forward in time, maybe it's likea trick of COVID Timewarp or
something, but it feels likefantastic progress.
And it also almost in a wayfeels to me like it's reflecting
(27:35):
the overall landscape of reallyrapidly changing policy in this
area.
I mean, it was only 2010 whenthere were only six states that
even had a Naloxone access lawand by 2017 all states had them.
And so this is just, this is
Dave Humes (27:50):
In varying degrees.
Yeah.
Valerie Earnshaw (27:54):
Is there anything more that you'd like to
say about that or we'recontinuing to break down
barriers?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
And it is interesting, likethere's, we'll have to link to
it Carly in the show notes, butthere's actually a nice map that
shows like how laws are changingand you're right.
Like there's just the, you know,Naloxone access law, but then
there's a whole bunch of otherpolicies that people have had
(28:16):
varying degrees of successes inpassing that helps, you know,
with access.
So anyway, I'm just, before wegot on this call, I was like,
"Carly, like Dave's also workingon some other policy.
I forgot what it is.
I'll have to ask about thestatus of that." So look at,
look at you.
Like it's just needing asignature that's great.
Dave Humes (28:34):
Well, you know, it's , it's been interesting because
this group of bunch of the momsand dads, since we've come into
existence and you have to throwlast year out, we've passed 17
bills, seven of them now overthat time period, seven of them
were specifically our bills.
10 of them were bills that wewere heavily in support of, you
(28:54):
know, made public comment beforecommittee hearings and that sort
of thing.
And right now we have theliability bill and three others
waiting for the governor tosign.
We have a concurrent resolutionthat we're waiting to get
passed.
It's going to declare August31st in Delaware, International
Overdose Awareness day.
(29:14):
And they're going to fly theflags at half staff in honor of
all those people who have beenlost.
So, you know, the billscontinue, but some of them go
very quickly and some of themdon't go so quickly.
And then it was reallyinteresting because when we look
to pass the Good Samaritan bill,back in 2013, we were in June of
the year.
And for people out thereDelaware only has a part time
(29:36):
legislature.
And they finish up at, at theend of June on June 30th and our
bills, didn't start to gothrough committee till June.
And there's only Tuesdays,Wednesdays and Thursdays are the
days where legislature meetscommittee hearings, full
legislature, whatever.
And we're getting through acouple of them who I said to one
of our champions on the bill,like"the end of June, we're
(30:01):
about done here." I said, Isaid,"I guess we're going to
have to wait until next year onthis thing".
And you know, I, I just rememberher looking me in the eye and
she said,"oh, we're going topass this bill!" And I went,
this is going to get done.
And we had our, our finalcommittee hearing on June 26 of
that year.
(30:21):
And usually from committee, thenit goes to the floor of the
respective house and the houseagreed to suspend their rules,
hold a special session so thatthey could vote on this bill and
not have to bring all theseparents who were there to
support the bill back on anotherday.
And you know, so here it went tothe last minute and, you know,
even, even our naloxone bill,the following year, which was
(30:43):
passed at the end of June and Istarted calling June funnel
month.
Cause it seems like crazy.
All the craziness of thelegislative year, all funnels
down to June, you know, nomatter how early you start, but
another bill that-- and I ammost proud of the 911 Good
Samaritan law that we passedhere for, for a lot of different
reasons, but, and I'm certainlyproud of election access law--
(31:05):
But the other one that I'mreally proud of that we passed
in, in 2019 is Opioid Impact FeeBill that took us four and a
half years to pass.
And it's a bill that puts aslight fee on the manufacturers
of all opioids that are sold inthe state of Delaware.
And those fees go into a specialfund stewardship fund to be used
(31:28):
to help people who, I like tosay, have been drug into
addiction.
You know, so Delaware was thefirst state in the nation to
pass this bill.
We had obviously a lot ofpushback from a lot of
representatives of themanufacturers of these opioids
and we knew it was going to bedifficult, but they're very
proud of that bill and the statehas now collected money.
(31:48):
And you know, is looking tospend that money to help some of
these people.
So we're really, really proud ofthat one.
Valerie Earnshaw (31:54):
Maybe this would be a good moment just to
press, to take a beat and talkabout the opioid crisis in
Delaware specifically, and whyit's important to do work in
this area.
So, Dave, I know you and I havebeen on some calls with the
national Institute on drug abusethat has highlighted rates of
overdose in Delaware.
And we've also talked about thisin some of our other episodes
(32:16):
that are coming out this summer,but Delaware is, you know, we're
the second smallest state Ithink in the nation, is that
right?
Carly's our native Delaware areaexpert.
Carly Hill (32:26):
It is true, we are second behind Rhode Island.
Valerie Earnshaw (32:28):
Thank you, Carly, but we are also second
highest in rates of deaths foroverdose.
So Dave, you correct me if I'mwrong and getting this history
about what looks like to me isthat we were not doing well
overall in overdoses, you know,through the 2010s, we were like
creeping up.
We were like for a while, itlooks like we were hanging
(32:49):
around 10th in the nation, butthen fentanyl hits and around
2017, we really pull ahead.
And then we're sort of uphovering with rates of overdose
that are similar to west thatare just after West Virginia.
So it's like West VirginiaDelaware, and then there's a
gap.
And then there's other statesthat at least for the 2019 data.
(33:10):
And when I've dug into it just alittle bit further, I see that,
you know, so it looks likefentanyl is an issue here, which
for folks listening, that's asynthetic opioid, it's just
super duper powerful and it getsmixed in into that heroin, into
the heroin supply.
And so people don't necessarilyknow how much fentanyl they're
getting and that can lead tooverdose.
(33:31):
But then I also saw that we hadjust recently over the weekend,
I found a whole new report, theDEA report, which I, which is
new to me.
So I'll have to dig in furtherto that, but that's the Drug
Enforcement Agency.
And I saw that we also havereally high rates of overdose
due to cocaine, which circlingback to Greg's story about like
cocaine and addiction.
I mean that, you know, that justmakes me think that we don't,
(33:55):
we're not taking cocaineseriously enough, but anyway, so
in sum, my impression is we havealways had an issue with
overdose in Delaware.
It seems to be getting worse,starting in 2017 when fentanyl
comes onto the scene and itlooks like we also are having an
issue with overdose, likerelated to cocaine.
So is that on track?
(34:17):
What am I missing?
Am I getting things wrong?
Dave Humes (34:19):
No.
You know, and I think really westarted to, despite even prior
to 2017, with the introductionto fentanyl.
Fentanyl...
when we talk about heroin herein the state of Delaware, one of
our largest police forces is ourNew Castle County police force.
And they told us that if you goback 15 years ago, the
(34:40):
composition of heroin was suchthat it was 30% pure.
The heroin that they are takingoff the street over the last
couple of years is 70% pure.
And sometimes as high as 90%pure.
So that's bad enough.
But when we talk about fentanyl,fentanyl is 50 to a hundred
times stronger than heroin.
(35:01):
So I was talking to my son theother day and I said, you gotta
help me with all these gigs andeverything.
I said, I understand miles perhour because I drive it, but
help me out with the gigs.
But so just to let peopleunderstand what fentanyl can do.
If you took a package of sugarthat you found in any coffee
shop, there's approximately 300grams of sugar in there.
(35:22):
If that's fentanyl three gramscan kill a person.
So if you're in a room of ahundred people, a sugar packet
of fentanyl can kill a hundredpeople.
And if you're in Delaware, ifyou have a shoe box of fentanyl,
you can take out the state.
Valerie Earnshaw (35:39):
Oh, wow.
That is powerful.
Dave Humes (35:40):
That's how strong this is.
So, you know, one of the thingsI just don't understand about
the dealers are why do you tryto kill your customers?
Don't you want repeat business?
And what the dealers are doing.
They're mixing fentanyl in withheroin.
They're mixing fentanyl in withcocaine, which is, this is
(36:01):
what's in part leading cocaine,overdose deaths.
They're putting the fentanyl inweed.
Because the idea is they want toget people hooked.
And so, you know, it's not FDAapproved stuff, you're buying
off the street, right?
So the, the dealers are tryingto get people hooked so that
they're mixing the fentanyl in.
(36:22):
And it, it's not just thatthey're mixing with other
illegal drugs, but in manyinstances, what they're trying
to do is they take the fentanyland they mix it with fillers and
whatnot and they buy pillpresses and they make it look
like oxy.
Valerie Earnshaw (36:37):
Okay.
Dave Humes (36:38):
So you have that whole thing going on with the
fentanyl, you know, that hasbeen really bad over the last
three or four years.
And again, that's a, that's anational thing.
Certainly, certainly I thinkhere in Delaware, I think 82% of
the overdose deaths have someamount of fentanyl within the
(36:58):
system.
So it's obviously a hugeproblem.
Valerie Earnshaw (37:02):
Yeah.
And then, I mean, COVID has justmade it worse.
So, I mean, you talked aboutthis a little bit earlier when
you were talking about Greg'sstory, but just this...
we, and we've talked about italso just this relationship
between like social isolationand disconnection and overdose
risk.
So first, you know, people whoare more socially isolated are
(37:22):
at greater risk of opioid useand then opioid use leads to
greater social isolation.
And then the other problem withsocial isolation, I think you
also like really hit this on thehead when you said like heroin
is not a party drug, like thepart of a risk of overdose is
using heroin or using theseopioids by yourself.
(37:44):
And as people have been sociallyisolated, as they've been more
likely to be using these drugsat home, then that increases the
risk of overdose.
And I'm not sure what thenumbers look like lately.
We'll have to probably wait andsee.
But, you know, we were at ameeting earlier on in the
epidemic where we saw the ratesfor Delaware and it just, it
looked like very bad news bearslooked pretty scary for
(38:07):
increases in overdose inDelaware.
So I'm sure we'll have to waitfor the dust to settle, to find
out more, but it's not going tobe good.
Dave Humes (38:14):
Yeah.
Last may in Delaware, we tiedfor the greatest number of
overdose deaths in a month.
So that was certainly in partdue to COVID and it looked as if
that would put us on track tofar exceed the overdoses from
the prior year, we did exceedthem, but not nearly as greatly
(38:36):
as expected, I guess the goodnews in all of this is that our
overdoses increased, but therate of overdose decreased.
So we are below double digitsfor the first time, since at
least 2012.
Valerie Earnshaw (38:53):
Oh, that's fantastic.
Dave Humes (38:54):
Yeah.
So that's good.
You know, part of it we canattribute certainly to Naloxone
to Narcan you know as we'vechanged some of these laws.
You know, like in Dave's perfectworld, I'd go buy a pickup truck
and have Valerie drive around.
And I'd be handing out Naloxoneto everybody I saw, you know,
Valerie Earnshaw (39:15):
Yeah.
Can we do that full time?
Like, can I turn retired?
Carly Hill (39:21):
I'm down, I'll buy a trunk.
Let's go.
Dave Humes (39:25):
You know, so we are getting more out there.
There's several organizationssuch as our organization that do
community trainings.
But I have to tell you, thereare some instances I've, I've
been critical of the state'seffort in various things.
But through this whole pandemic,they have done a really good job
of getting Naloxone out into thehands of the public.
(39:47):
And one of them, you know, oneof the studies that we've done
has been produced here inDelaware says that 79% of
overdoses occur in a residence.
Now it's not necessarily anoverdose death.
That's just an overdose, right.
Of those 79% of residences wherethey occur, only 7% have
(40:09):
Naloxone.
So that's why it's important toget more and more of naloxone
out there.
The other thing that comes intoplay as well is with fentanyl.
Typically when, when wedistribute Naloxone, people get
two doses.
So if in the instance where onedose of Narcan isn't working
(40:30):
after about five minutes, andyou've tried a couple other
things you give a second doseand hopefully that brings them
up, you know, get somebreathing, the respiration going
again.
But with fentanyl, it's sostrong sometimes two don't do
it.
And we've heard instances wherethree, four and five, you know,
administrations have been made.
So even if you have your twodoses, sometimes with fentanyl,
(40:52):
you can still be in some toughsituations.
Valerie Earnshaw (40:55):
So Dave, I'd like to kind of, to close us out
by thinking about if folks arelistening and they're interested
in making policy changes relatedto some of these issues in their
state or their localcommunities, or maybe, you know,
something else.
I'm curious as to what kind ofadvice you might give to people
who, who want to be like Daveand make some change.
Dave Humes (41:19):
Well, the first thing is when it comes to, we've
been calling this the publichealth crisis of the 21st
century.
And I'm still going to call itthat despite COVID, because
we're coming out of COVID and atsome point within the next year,
or, you know, hopefully we'llhave it totally under control.
We've been going through thisopioid crisis for two decades
(41:39):
now, you know, so that's why Icall it the public health crisis
of the 21st century.
But the first thing to realizeabout this is you look down in
Washington or you're looking invarious states.
This is one issue that is reallya nonpartisan issue.
And you get support from bothpolitical parties on it.
(42:01):
You can't pass legislationunanimously, you know, if you
don't have the support of bothparties.
So the first thing is tounderstand that this is a
non-partisan issue to getinvolved, you know, get involved
at the local levels is where youwant to get involved.
We're fortunate here inDelaware, as a small state, we
(42:22):
can very easily be in touch withour elected officials or our
state senators our staterepresentatives.
You know, I know in Pennsylvaniait's more difficult.
They have a very largelegislature in Pennsylvania and
they have some 250 legislatorsin PA.
So, and PA is one of 10legislatures that is considered
(42:42):
full-time.
So it's much more difficult, youknow, in a, in a larger state,
but you can still do it.
When we passed our goodSamaritan law here in Delaware,
it was signed by the governor onJuly 2nd.
And on that night, my wife and Iwent to dinner and I got up the
next morning and I startedmaking some phone calls in
Pennsylvania, it's where Gregwas born, right, spent most of
(43:06):
his life.
That's where the detective toldme"we need a 911 or Good
Samaritan law".
That next morning, July 3rd, Istarted making phone calls to
people in Pennsylvania.
And we put together a coalitionin Pennsylvania of nonprofit
groups that we found in allcorners of the state.
And we put that together and ittook longer because again,
Pennsylvania has a largelegislature.
(43:27):
We started it in July.
We started bringing peopletogether.
We finally passed a bill thatincorporated both community
access to Naloxone and 911 GoodSamaritan, all in one bill.
And it was finally signed bythen governor Tom Corbett on
September 30th, 2014.
So we did it in little statesand we did it in large states,
(43:48):
but you know, what you reallywant to do is you want one to
find out who your locallegislators are.
If you can, you know, you wantto try and set up meetings with
them.
In some states, they havemonthly, you know, constituent
coffees, you know, which isyou're going to be there with a
bunch of people, but you'regoing to get some access and
you're going to get some facetime.
Don't be afraid to seek themout, you know, send emails to
(44:09):
them, trying to, you know, get ameeting with them.
And, you know, you want to berespectful.
I mean, everybody has theiropinion of legislators
sometimes, but you know, youwant to be respectful because
you know, most of them work veryhard.
They spend a lot of time offhours and whatnot, you know,
doing things for yourconstituents and everything.
(44:29):
So there are a couple of thingsthat you can do.
I think you want to try andtouch base with your media.
I think as you try to passlegislation in the instance of
addiction issues, I always lookat it as sort of a two-prong
thing.
I look at it as, you know, oldpoops like me and younger
people.
I get a lot of my informationfrom the newspaper.
(44:51):
So you want to hit new localnewspapers, local media, and try
to get them to cover thesestories a little bit.
And then you want to develop asocial media platform so that
you can reach, you know, youngergenerations.
People might, you know, forinstance, my son Dave's age, so
you can reach them there, youstart creating awareness.
You know, of the problem, youknow, there are a couple of
(45:13):
things that you can do right offthe bat.
I always suggest that whenyou're looking at the media, you
try to find their healthreporters.
Valerie Earnshaw (45:19):
Okay.
Dave Humes (45:21):
Yeah.
And every time we've tried topass these laws, we, you know, a
lot of instances in some states,they want to do it as a criminal
justice issue.
We've always tried to make it ahealth and social services or
health and human services, ahuman issue rather than a law
enforcement issue.
But we all always want to buildconsensus with law enforcement.
(45:42):
We've been fortunate here inDelaware.
Our law enforcement has beenvery progressive in addressing
this issue.
And, and early on, I rememberwhen a police chief saying we
can't handcuff our way out ofthis.
Again, a very large policedepartment, New Castle County
here in Delaware.
They started a program a coupleof years ago, it's called hero
help.
And if you need help withaddiction issues, you can go
(46:05):
into the police station, requesthelp, and they will help you.
As long as you have no seriouscharges against you, you have no
major felonies.
They will literally take you todetox.
They will follow up.
They will see about getting somepost detox care and whatnot.
So, you know, we're seeing a lotof progress on that front with
law enforcement.
So we we've been fortunatethere, but you know, you want to
(46:27):
build a coalition of partnersand that includes both ends of
the spectrum.
You know, you want, you want totry and make friends with people
who seemingly are opposed tothese ideas.
Valerie Earnshaw (46:39):
So this is super helpful, I mean, so I'm
hearing a lot of coalitionbuilding I'm hearing like making
direct contact with thepolicymakers who are
representing you.
I'm hearing, you know, earlieron in your story, when you were
talking about crafting theseemails, I'm hearing a lot about
like sharing personal storiesand reasons as well.
You know, getting word out,educating your community.
(47:01):
I'm curious as to how scientistswho are, you know, local
scientists like me, or, youknow, scientists who might be
really working in areas thatyou're trying to advocate
around, maybe nationally, howthey can be helpful for these,
like for these efforts.
And I'm also curious, you know,I know that you're, you know,
(47:22):
you're pulling in great data andyou're pulling in great science,
like, as you are also advocatingfor these changes as well, and
sort of, where are you findingthat science?
Like, how are you accessingthat?
Like along the way.
Are scientists calling you Dave?
We should be calling you...
Dave Humes (47:41):
We do.
And that's how you and I, youand I came into contact with one
another.
So it's time for Dave to pullout another one of his
collection of quotes.
I love this one,"nothing aboutus without us", early on, we saw
policy being driven from the topdown and policy needs to be
driven from the trenches.
Scientific data collection andwhatnot needs to be driven from
(48:06):
the trenches.
You know, I've often said thatwith some of the policies coming
down, people are sitting saying"this is what we think they
need.
Let's give it to them." And Isaid,"why don't you ask them
what it is they need?" So, youknow, it's the same thing with
the science community, you know,what are things that are needed?
What science can do.
(48:27):
I think science can look intostudies of how we recover.
You know, let's take a look atdifferent types of MAT, you
know, Medical AssistedTreatment.
Let's look at methadone, let'slook at buprenorphine, let's
look at naltrexone and let'slook at abstinence.
The four main things that areout there what's more effective.
(48:48):
Can we find out one being moreeffective than the other?
I volunteered for several yearswith an IOP group, which is
intensive outpatient program.
And it was mainly younger peoplewho were sent there by the drug
diversion courts and veryun-scientific sample, certainly
small sample size, justanecdotal my personal
experience.
(49:08):
The people who progressed bestto the IOP to get their charges
dropped and everything were theones that were on naltrexone.
And I just have a strange samplesize there that seemed to work
or, you know, is that applicablein real life?
So that's an area that I wouldlike to see more science
involved.
One of the big fights when welooked at Naloxone and it's
(49:32):
still out there, you know, wehear, oh, when you administer
Naloxone, you're going to wakeup a raging beast and that
person's going to come out of itand rip your heart out and
whatnot.
You know, things like that havebeen said by legislators, it's
not an exact quote, but it'sclose.
And my contention as anon-medical person.
Is can this happen?
(49:52):
Yeah certainly it can happen.
But when we talk about the layperson, administration of
naloxone like we're doing out inthe community, this is
relatively small dosagescompared to somebody being taken
care of medically and getting anIV of Naloxone, which may put
them into a violent reaction.
So I would love to see somestudies there to show people.
(50:15):
I've seen five abstracts, again,small sample size that basically
say, does it happen?
Yeah, but it only happens 7% ofthe time.
As long as we're talking about aviolent reaction where there's,
you know, hands on, onsomebody's shouting and
screaming that you ruined theirhigh is abusive, but you know,
it's certainly not, you know,it's not violent.
(50:37):
Another study I think that wouldbe great from scientists is
looking into safe injectionsites.
Valerie Earnshaw (50:44):
Yes, yeah
Dave Humes (50:44):
When I talk about safe injection sites, I don't
speak for our organization.
I speak for myself on this onebecause we haven't decided how
we're going to handle it.
I'm in favor of safe injectionsites.
They've been doing it in Canadafor quite a while.
Now they have a pretty goodtrack record.
I think in, in 20 some yearsthey have only lost one person
to overdose in 20 years and youhave to go"wow", there was, um,
(51:09):
some, some of the listeners haveprobably heard about the Safe
House in Philadelphia, who havebeen looking into establishing
safe injection sites inPhiladelphia.
And I'm very pleased to say thathere in Delaware, the attorney
general joined Safe Houses intheir suit to approve safe
injection sites.
So I think that's another areathat could be studied.
(51:31):
Several years ago, and I haven'tdone any follow up since, but
there was a doctor at ScrippsInstitute out in California.
I think his name was Dr.
Janda and he was actuallyworking on vaccines that people
could be vaccinated againstopioid addiction.
And he also felt as if it couldapply to alcohol and that sort
(51:54):
of thing as well, where he is asfar as clinical trials or as he
got an approval of clinicaltrials.
And, you know, if that's thescience, we can, we can inject
people at birth, to rejectopioids or something like that.
That's something else thatcertainly we can look into, but
no, I, again, I just think it'sreally important to talk to the
(52:15):
people who have gone through it,you know, to get their feedback
and get their suggestions.
Valerie Earnshaw (52:21):
I feel like you just mapped out like several
careers worth of, of science forfolks.
So that's really helpful, youknow, and to me, you know, what
I'm really hearing here is acall for more like community
engaged and maybe participatoryaction research is sometimes
like what folks call this in thefield, really this idea of, you
know, you knocked it out with"nothing about us without us".
(52:44):
That's a call that scientistshave been hearing like for
decades and in the HIV movementand in other areas.
And I think it's so importantfor me to keep hearing that for
others of us who are listening,who are scientists to keep
hearing that because, you know,you don't get into studying this
area just for fun, you get intostudying this area and doing
(53:06):
work in this area because youwant to help people.
And I think it's a reallypowerful thing to hear from you,
Dave, that, well, if you want tobe helpful for people, you have
to talk to them to hear aboutwhat's going on in their lives
and also to learn about, youknow, how am I going to know
what policy issues the moversand shakers are making in my,
(53:27):
you know, in my area, unless I've talked to them and find out
like, oh, there's some interestin, you know, and again, this is
you, but i n safe injectionsites, well, that's interesting.
Like what can I do to be helpfulin building an e vidence b ase
that will help people tounderstand that this is a good
thing.
So that's really helpful.
And it's a great call to actionfor folks who are listening.
(53:48):
Dave, I really admire yourleadership and your advocacy.
I'm so glad that you got greedywith the l ife-saving like, it's
just so tremendous.
And I really can't wait to getthis truck to go just full time,
distributing Naloxone inDelaware.
And t hen we're going to go upto Pennsylvania and just go like
(54:10):
nationwide.
I think that this is going to betremendous.
Dave Humes (54:13):
One last stolen quote.
Valerie Earnshaw (54:15):
Okay.
Yes, please.
Dave Humes (54:17):
"The job of the citizen is to keep their mouth
open" It's a quote from agentleman by the name of Gunther
Grass who is a German.
Valerie Earnshaw (54:27):
What a good one.
Will you please keep your mouthopen and we'll do the same.
Carly Hill (54:30):
We'll shout louder behind you, Dave.
Thanks Dave.
Valerie Earnshaw (54:42):
Thanks to the Stigma and Health Inequities lab
at the University of Delawarefor their help at the podcast,
including Sarah Lopez, MollyMarine, James Wallace, and
Ashley Roberts.
Carly Hill (54:52):
Thanks to city girl for the music as always be sure
to check us out on Instagram@sexdrugsscience, and stay up to
date on new episodes by clickingsubscribe.
Valerie Earnshaw (55:00):
Thanks to all of you for listening.
[Music]
I'm Valerie Earnshaw.
Carly Hill (00:13):
I'm Carly Hill,
Valerie Earnshaw (00:14):
And this is sex drugs and science.
Carly Hill (00:17):
Today's conversation is with Dave Humes, who is a
board member of attackaddiction, a local advocacy
group, focused on addiction herein Delaware.
He's a Naloxone trainer, amember of the drug overdose
fatality review commission, andthe co-chair of the Changing
Perceptions and Stigmasubcommittee of the behavioral
health consortium in Delaware.
Valerie Earnshaw (00:36):
Uh, Carly, I haven't told Dave this, but I
have a lot of affection for himbecause he reminds me of like
all of my uncles.
I feel like I could count onDave to tell dad jokes at a
picnic or meet me on, you know,95 or a local highway if my car
broke down.
So I don't know.
Am I off base?
Carly Hill (00:55):
No, I think Dave is way cooler! I wish Dave was my
uncle actually.
Valerie Earnshaw (00:59):
But then unlike my uncles, Steve spends
his days distributing Naloxoneall over our state, which is a
medication that can reverseopioid overdoses and he has this
like, you know, little interestin supervised consumption sites
as a form of harm reductions,which is still like mega
controversial.
There are places where peoplecan use drugs under supervision
(01:22):
of medical professionals andthere, you know, another
strategy to prevent overdosestats.
David's done a lot of work inDelaware and other states to get
Naloxone policies passed.
And now he's kind of turning toother policies to address the
opioid crisis and reduceoverdose rates.
So we were really interested ingetting to know Dave story and
(01:42):
continuing our conversation thissummer about the intersection of
science and policy with him.
So please enjoy thisconversation with uncle Dave
Humes, Dave Humes, welcome tothe podcast.
Thanks for joining us.
Dave Humes (02:03):
Thank you, Carly.
Thank you, Valerie.
Thrilled to be here, to talk toyou about some really important
issues.
Valerie Earnshaw (02:09):
So we have a lot of folks who aren't from
Delaware, who listen so for thepeople who aren't Delaware.
I just want them to know thatwe're chatting today with like a
local superhero celebrity,especially in the area of--
Dave Humes (02:22):
hardly.
Valerie Earnshaw (02:24):
made a lot of good changes in our local opioid
crisis.
So, so Dave, for the folks whohaven't had the benefit of
attending one of your Naloxonetrainings or reading about you
in the paper, which Carly and Ihave both done both.
Tell us a little bit just aboutyour background and how you got
involved in some of these issuessurrounding the opioid crisis
(02:45):
and recovery in Delaware.
Dave Humes (02:47):
Absolutely I said it many times in public meetings.
I like to steal a good quotewhen I can find one.
And I like to start out, youknow, to tell the listeners with
a quote,"never doubt that asmall group of thoughtful,
concerned citizens can changethe world".
Indeed.
It's the only thing that everhas.
And as we talk today, I hopethat your listeners will keep in
(03:09):
mind.
I'm really nobody special.
I'm just a dad.
And when I talk about our, ournonprofit organization Attack
Addiction, I jokingly say we'rejust a bunch of dumb moms and
dads trying to figure it outbecause we're not professionals
at what we do, but you know, wetry and find a way to get things
done.
So I'm a person in long-termrecovery from alcohol and
(03:32):
illegal drugs.
I am not somebody who ever usedheroin.
And I don't say that because Iwould be embarrassed to say so I
say that because I think it's adifferent type of addiction, a
stronger type of addiction thanall these other addictions.
If we go back to Philip SeymourHoffman, he's somebody who had
(03:53):
been addicted to heroin had 20years of sobriety and something
drew him back and he overdosedand died.
So again, I've been in recoveryfor a long time, but the thing
that got me involved is I hadtwo sons who were a year apart
and they did absolutelyeverything together.
They were playing sports teamstogether.
(04:14):
They, they liked the same musicand bands and went to concerts
together and everything.
And then my younger son, Greg,he started doing what people do
as teenagers.
You know, they are wired toexperiment, to push limits, push
boundaries and whatnot.
And, but both my boys, you know,did a little experimentation.
They, you know, they, they weredoing mushrooms and they were
(04:35):
smoking some weed and that sortof thing.
And, but my son, Greg kept goingand he started using other
things such as cocaine, which isinteresting because at the time
we tried to get him into a rehaband they said, uh, you know, we
can't take him because cocaineisn't addictive.
Once it's out of your system,it's all gone.
(04:55):
You know, if you had a problemwith alcohol.
So we said, oh yeah, we forgotabout the alcohol problem.
Just to get them into some sortof treatment.
That's the way things were.
And then it-- this goes backinto about 2006, 2007, somewhere
in there, you know?
So anyhow, you know, his useprogressed and he started using
heroin.
He was introduced to heroin,started smoking a little bit.
(05:19):
And finally he ran into a ladyfriend and it's not her fault,
but she introduced him toinjecting and whatnot and to
feed his habit, he got involvedin some things he shouldn't have
gotten involved in and ended upgoing to prison.
And when I, what I have to telleverybody about Greg, is anybody
who ever met him would describehim with one word.
(05:41):
And that was sweet.
You know, oftentimes we think ofpeople who get addicted to these
substances as being, you know,risk takers and whatnot.
And what we found out along thisjourney, some of the other
parents that have been involvedas it's typically people who
feel as if they don't fit in,who are quiet, more sensitive
and whatnot.
(06:01):
And that's why they turn todifferent drugs.
So, Greg was really a sweet kid.
He really was.
And you know, here's somebodygoing to prison and they go,
well, that doesn't sound sosweet to me, you know, but in
effect it was, he served 21months in prison.
And when he was released, youknow, we had the talks of course
about, you know, not startingrelationships and that sort of
(06:23):
thing.
Uh, you know, get yourselfstraight before you do that.
Then, you know, he started arelationship and he, uh, ended
up violating his parole and hewent back to prison.
His second stint in prison, itwas, it was Rocky between he and
I at first because he violatedshortly before Christmas, you
know, I was angry.
And even though I knew aboutaddiction or thought I knew
(06:46):
about addiction, I still didn'tknow enough to understand about
heroin and whatnot.
So we, we were, you know, wewere on icy terms at the time
and they cooled, certainly,because again, the only thing
you can really do is give yourlove and support to try to get
them back on the right path.
And it was while he was doinghis second stint in prison.
(07:08):
And he said, you know, I,"Icoasted the first time around
and he said, but I don't want tospend my life institutionalized,
whether it be rehabilitation orcorrectional facilities".
And he really got it at thattime.
He was in prison inPennsylvania.
He got released on parole to mywife and I, we had his parole
(07:29):
transferred here to Delaware.
Originally I'm originally fromPennsylvania and he was doing
absolutely everything right inhis life.
He was exercising.
He was very engaged with my wifeand I.
He wasn't, you know, he wasn'tupstairs on the computer or on
his phone, you know, we'd watchsporting events together.
And, and he, you know, he wasjust very engaged with us.
(07:50):
He'd go to bed early, get upearly in the morning, do
meditation, do some exercising.
He was getting ready toparticipate in one of those mud
runs for MS.
Valerie Earnshaw (08:00):
Yeah! Like many early 20 year olds.
Dave Humes (08:07):
He was completing his community service at the
food bank of Delaware andwhatnot.
And he was doing everythingabsolutely right in his life.
And he was gradually gettingtogether with his old friends,
because some people like toportray opioid addiction, heroin
addiction, as a party drug, andnothing could be further from
the truth.
It's a drug of shame.
And so it distances you from thegood people in your life it
(08:30):
distanced him from his brotherwho was so very close, but he
was starting to get togetheragain with the people who were
the good guys in his life andgetting reacclimated to
normalizing his life.
And we had conversations aboutdifferent things.
He was working for me at thetime in a small business.
He had a great aptitude for it.
We spent a lot of hours in thecar going to job sites, driving
(08:53):
up to north Jersey and Virginiaand that sort of thing, and
talking about some things.
And one of the things I had saidto him was that I really felt
that he should quit drinking aswell, because he had never, you
know, apparently had a problem,a drinking problem.
But I thought I said to him, Isaid, you know, my fear is that
some night you'll drink too muchand clouds your judgment.
You'll say, now I can do thisagain.
(09:13):
And then you'll be off andrunning again.
And what happened as he wasreacclimating himself, he was
out with some friends.
That I knew that were the goodguys in his life.
And he bumped into some oldrunning mates of his and, uh,
you know clouded judgment.
And he thought he could go outand do this one more time.
And you know, when you, whenyou're away from opioids for
(09:34):
awhile, you have a change intolerance.
And he tried to use what he hadused before.
And that decision proved to befatal.
And the people he was with, theylifted him up.
They put them in his car.
They drove him to the parkinglot of a hospital and they
simply walk away.
They did not, they did not go tothe emergency room doors and
(09:55):
punch on that red button and runlike crazy.
They didn't hit the key fob toget the horn beeping and run
away.
They didn't go a block away andtry to call and say,"Hey, go
look in parking lot." They just,they just left them there.
And by the time they discoveredhim, it was too late.
They rushed him in and theytried to revive him, but he had
been there too long.
(10:15):
And in the aftermath I met withthe investigating detective two
days later, after, as a matterof fact, two days from now,
Wednesday will mark, the ninthyear, since he's been gone to
the day.
But two days later, I met withthe investigating detective to
reclaim his belongings, his carand that sort of thing.
And the detective said to me,you know, if we had a 911 good
(10:38):
Samaritan Law, or a Narcan Law,your son might very well be
alive today.
Valerie Earnshaw (10:42):
Oh okay.
Dave Humes (10:42):
And those were the words that stuck with me, I was
trying to decide what I wasgoing to do.
I had a small business at thetime, and I talked to some
people who advise mefinancially.
If somebody says, they own abusiness, you know, they got an
expensive car and everything.
It was a small business.
Let me tell you.
We have a nice little townhouse,but again, nothing special.
(11:06):
But I talked to some financialpeople and they said, you guys
don't live high on the hog.
You know, if, if you want toretire, now you can probably do
it.
So the goal was really to try todo something about this whole
crisis at the time.
And I made the decision to closedown my business and people said
to me,"you dummy, why didn't yousell it?" And I didn't show it
(11:30):
because I didn't want to beinvolved in it anymore.
And I knew I would have had tosign a contract, you know, for
consulting for a number ofperiods.
I decided really just to closeit down because most of the
business was in my head, 90% ofit.
So it took some time to close itdown.
I wanted to make sure, you know,I did things right.
Didn't leave anybody out,hanging out there.
Then that took me to October of2012.
(11:53):
And you know, I was ready tosort of jump into the fight, but
Thanksgiving was coming up and Iknew the first Thanksgiving
would be extremely hard.
It's always been my favoriteholiday.
You know, just immediate family,no presents, no cards, all that
stuff.
It's just family gatherings.
And I said, I, I, you know, Ibetter hold off, which I did.
And during the course of closingdown my business, the end of
(12:16):
September, prior to being closeddown, the local newspaper had a
front page story on heroin.
And I read that article and Ifolded it up and I put it in the
corner of my desk.
And I said, I'm going to getback to this.
So in January of 2013, January2nd, probably it was, I picked
up that newspaper.
(12:36):
I read through it, anybody whowas quoted in there, I reached
out and I contacted.
And I was really fortunatebecause one of the people that
had led me to the doorstep ofGenie and Don Keester, who had
started an organization here inDelaware called attack
addiction.
They had lost their son onDecember 23rd, 2012.
(12:57):
You know, you think about that.
If that's not bad enough, it wasworse for them because it was
also their daughter's birthday.
That's what she has to live within that time of year, every
year.
And then they started thisorganization within two months
of the loss of their son, Tyler.
And they started theorganization, not as a support
group, but as an opentransparent action group, we
(13:21):
were determined to do something.
My Vow, after losing Greg, likevow to him, was to somehow save
a life in his name.
And I didn't care if I knew thatperson's name, I didn't care if
they knew Greg's or my name.
But the idea was to somehow savea life in his name.
(13:42):
Of course, it's like, well, howdo you do this?
Valerie Earnshaw (13:45):
Sure.
Dave Humes (13:45):
So what we decided to do at Attack Addiction was
well we said, okay, what do wedo?
I brought up that quote from thedetective.
"If we had a 9 1, 1 or a goodSamaritan law.
Some might very well be alivetoday" when we decided that
would be a good idea at the timewe were a small group.
And the decision was whether wetried to get a bill passed with
(14:05):
both of those things in there,or whether just go for one.
And if we were just going to tryfor one how to go about it,
which one should we select?
Valerie Earnshaw (14:15):
Oh, this is, let me put a pause here because
I have a million questions foryou.
And I'm so excited because, youknow, to hear about the, you
know, how you started workingtowards the, making these
changes in the bills, but youstarted out.
So first off, I just want to saythat you started the story by
saying that, you know, you'renobody special and I've just
(14:39):
have got to disagree, you know,because as you're telling this
story and I just, I want to saya huge thanks to you for sharing
it, both, you know, here andCarly and I have heard you share
it in other places as well.
And I don't know what theexperience of sharing that story
is, but the experience for me ofhearing your story, like every
(15:01):
time I'm, teary-eyed, every timeI'm, I'm super moved and it's
such a powerful, it's a powerfulstory and it's, it must be hard
to share it, but it's also sucha gift for allowing people to
hear more about the experienceas you go along and tell it
you're, you're bustingstereotypes left and right.
(15:22):
Like it's really amazing.
And you're also underscoringsome big problems, like, you
know, something that jumped outto me on this one, just was
that, you know, we've had a fewconversations now around how we
take a criminal justice approachrather than a public health
approach towards addiction.
And in this story, like, why isit that Greg landed in jail
(15:47):
twice or, you know, circulatesthrough prison, but he doesn't
get care?
Like you took him to care and hedidn't get care.
We talked last summer with apediatrician, Scott Hanlon, who,
who really highlighted for us,how we're lacking in treatment
for young people.
And so that's one thing thatruns through my mind with this,
but I also just, like, Ipersonally resonate quite a bit
(16:10):
with your story in terms of,well, first off I was born in
Pennsylvania, moved to Delaware.
So we both have that same, youknow, migration pattern..
Dave Humes (16:20):
We have that Commonwealth of knowledge.
Carly Hill (16:27):
*ba dum tss*
Valerie Earnshaw (16:27):
We have similar humor a pparently.
And then I can also relate tojust like getting really bad.
Our family got really bad advicein the 2000's about addiction,
you know, and about y eah.
How to respond to it.
And you know, what treatmentoptions were available to us, we
also have lost, you know, afamily member to overdose.
(16:49):
And so then I have to push backon you about this, like nothing
special piece.
I mean, in some ways, you know,many families have lost people
to addiction.
Many fathers have lost sons tooverdose and not all of them
have, you know, retired earlyand really thrown themselves
(17:09):
into this movement.
And it's amazing that youconnected with another family,
you know, you connected with theKeesters early on and found some
folks were also doing that, butthat's the only part of your
story that I have to disagreewith and push b ack o n.
Carly Hill (17:23):
Well, that, and I was just gonna say, Dave, you've
also, you know, saved more than,than one life for Greg too.
I know that through your workwith the Naloxone training and
all that.
So I have to agree that I thinkyou were pretty wrong about the
nothing special thing, butcontinue,
Dave Humes (17:38):
You know, I, I say that because I want people to
realize that they can step upand do this.
Really.
You know, if you step up, youcan make these changes
certainly.
And you, it's interesting aboutsaving a life it's...
I wanted to save a life and thenI got greedy, not enough.
Valerie Earnshaw (18:00):
Best place to be greedy in!
Dave Humes (18:01):
T hat, yeah.
Yeah, y eah.
And one of those saved throughthis w ork was my cousin,
Valerie Earnshaw (18:07):
oh my God,
Dave Humes (18:08):
I got a call from one of my cousins and said, you
saved your cousin's life.
I said, what are you talkingabout?
And he said, the overdosed, theycalled 911, they administered
Naloxone and he's alive.
You know?
So you hear that and you know ithits you certainly, it really
hits you.
Valerie Earnshaw (18:25):
All right.
Well, let's return the wheel toyou.
You got us up to the part of thestory where you've gotten
together with the Keesters, youhave formed to talk addiction,
you're a board member of AttackAddiction, which is fantastic.
And you're making a decisionabout whether to pursue just the
Narcan access laws or the goodSamaritan or both in
(18:46):
combination.
So could you, could you catch upfolks who may not be familiar
with Narcan?
I know you're very familiar witht his.
If you catch them u p j ust t owhat that...
Dave Humes (18:57):
So just very briefly about good Samaritan because
that leads to the Naloxone.
So our decision was to try toget a law, a 911 good Samaritan
law, which would allow people tocall 911 without being arrested,
charged, or prosecuted, both theperson who made the call and the
person who was in medicaldistress.
So it seemed to us,"that's agood idea.
(19:18):
It doesn't cost the state anymoney, how can they object to
that?" So that was really ourstrategy.
But even to get there before youget to the 911 good Samaritan
law, we have to go to the samesex marriage act.
Because again, we were just abunch of dumb moms and dads
like, well,"how do you pass alaw?" We know basically how to
(19:41):
pass a law, but what's theactual process?
What do you have to go through?
So at the same time in 2013,Delaware was looking at passing,
changing the law to allow samesex marriage that had been
worked on from early on duringthe legislative session and
actually passed through itsfinal step at the end of April
(20:02):
or early May of that year.
So what we did is as a strategy,we looked at that bill and we
looked at the members of theSenate, how they voted.
We looked at the members of thehouse as they voted.
And the people who were in favorof that bill, we thought would
be sympathetic to our cause ofthe 911 good Samaritan law.
And we thought we may have to dosome further education to those
(20:25):
who had voted against the samesex.
So we took sort of a two-prongedapproach and, you know, we shot
to educate them as to why theyshould pass that bill.
So, you know, ultimately we weresuccessful passing it, the same
sex marriage bill was a littlebit over 50% vote in favor of it
to pass that bill, both in thehouse and the Senate here in
(20:46):
Delaware.
And when we, it was just, it wasso moving when we passed the
good Samaritan bill, because inthe Senate, we passed it
unanimously.
And then the house we did thesame, there were three members
who weren't present to vote, butJewish, just really a very
moving thing.
So following the same sexmarriage path into the 911 Good
Samaritan bill, you know, led usto say, okay, we've done this.
(21:09):
We've sorta learned how to gothrough this.
Now we can try to get theNaloxone bill passed.
So we, we used much of the samestrategy that we had used before
with the good Samaritan bill.
And, you know, we, we found achampion and a sponsor.
We actually had, uh, a billwritten up by a lawyer that was
(21:29):
specific to Delaware.
And they said,"Eh do you want itsort of tight, or you want it
really broad?" We said,"make itas broad as possible!" We can
get it through broad, that'sgreat.
You know, if we have to makesome concessions along the lines
, you know, so be it.
So anyhow, that was thefollowing year in 2014.
And again, we use that samestrategy.
We had our organization by thattime was growing.
(21:51):
We asked all of our members, wethought we were geniuses at the
time.
We're not the only ones shoulddo this.
We asked each of our members, wegave them some talking points.
And what we asked them to do isput together an email to their
own representatives.
The first thing they want to sayin that is they're a constituent
and a registered voter in thereand tell them why they were in
(22:11):
favor of this bill.
And we told them what we alsowanted them to do is reach out
to five other people and askthem to do the same, reach out,
to-- have them reach out to fivemore.
Through some of our studies andwhatnot, it was our
understanding that when youcontact one of your state
representatives, electedofficials, that each contact
(22:33):
represents about a hundredpeople.
So you have to go wow on that.
"Never thought of that.
I just thought I was just somedumb guy" you know, state
Senator or whatever, you know,so, you know, it really has an
impact.
You know, we used, we puttogether a fact sheet about
Naloxone and we told them, youknow, it was FDA approved in
(22:53):
1971.
It had no, you know, it couldnot be abused in any way, shape
or form.
Like some of the MAT could, youknow, it was innert, it only
affected opioids and didn'taffect anything else.
So if you gave it to somebodywho was not in an opioid
overdose, it would not helpthem, but it would not harm
them.
So we had this fact sheet thatwe made sure we send out to them
(23:16):
to help pass the bill.
And we were successful passingthat one as well.
We also sorta jumped in on withone of our representatives who
were supportive.
And at the same time, they had abill that would allow all
departments of peace officers inthe state of Delaware to be
trained in carrying Naloxone,local police couldn't just say
(23:38):
at the time"we're going to carryNaloxone because it's going to
save lives." You know, alldepartments had to be allowed to
do it under Delaware law them tobe able to do it.
So that bill was also passed,you know, at that same point in
time.
So we have been involved andwritten the initial bill of
anything, having to do withNaloxone in our state.
So we've had several bills afterthat, that have been passed.
(24:01):
We have one right now thatawaits the governor's signature,
we found out in Delaware, wehave a behavioral health
consortium that addresses mentalhealth and addiction issues.
And we have a subcommittee onchanging perceptions and stigma.
And as a result of our work onthat committee, we found out
that our original Naloxone billdid not grant immunity from
(24:23):
liability for lay peopleadministering it.
So right now that passed bothhouses pretty readily.
And we're just waiting to findout when the governor's going to
sign that one.
Carly Hill (24:34):
Can you tell our listeners a little bit more,
when you say about the liabilityof administering Naloxone, can
you tell us a little bit aboutthat?
Dave Humes (24:41):
Well, some of the bills that have been passed
along the way and gave, you know, police officers liability from
being sued formis-administration of Naloxone.
And it was a very importantthing for them to have that some
of those, those issues to me,it's like this can't hurt
anybody.
How can you mis-administer?
You know, we look to try to findinstances of where there had
(25:04):
been allergic reactions oranything.
And to this day, I haven't foundone.
I can't tell you, I spent, youknow, 24 hours a day, day, you
know, throughout the yearlooking for it, but we haven't
been able to find that, but itcame as a result because in our
work with the subcommittee fromthe consortium, we went to some
trade groups and said, you know,we were talking to them about
(25:25):
their hiring policies for peoplewho had had convictions for
illegal drugs, what theirpolicies were on treatment.
If they discovered somebody whowas in use and the end of the
one meeting, I said, oh, by theway, if you ever want to have
your folks trained out in thefield, do use Naloxone.
We're happy to do it because weknow people in recovery
gravitate toward theconstruction industry, to the
(25:46):
restaurant industry and whatnot.
And what we found out from thatwas that the companies, the
construction companies, therestaurants and whatnot, they
were in favor of it, but theysaid that their insurers were
against it because they fearedliability.
And again, it's, you know, it'sa matter of people not
understanding that there's verylittle harm, you know, that you
(26:08):
can receive from Naloxone andwhatnot.
So, you know, we talked to theinsurance department, insurance
departments at timeout, andthat's a legal issue.
Go talk to the department ofjustice.
So we got in touch with thedepartment of justice and they
said, you know, actually thatoriginal bill does not have that
liability protection in it.
So you'd probably need a bill.
So it was okay that you puttogether a bill and again, so
we're just awaiting a signatureon that.
(26:29):
Right now, we still needadditional protection against
liabilities because thecompanies themselves would like
it.
And we get pushback from someorganizations when it comes to
immunity.
So we have to be careful withlanguage we have to try to, you
know, put out a bill, that'sgoing to be palatable to some of
these organizations who areagainst it for various reasons.
Valerie Earnshaw (26:50):
I'm so impressed, Dave, that this is
already awaiting a signature.
I feel like, I mean, maybeyou've been-- hearing you talk
about this liability issue,maybe you've been talking about
it for longer than I'm aware of,but I feel like it was only a
couple months ago where you, Iwas at one of these subcommittee
meetings and you're like, oh,"we've figured out that this
(27:11):
liability thing is a barrier topeople wanting to get trained
and to using Narcan." And so youwere like,"we're going to try
and change it", you know?
And to me not, you know, it justfeels like, you know, fast
forward in time, maybe it's likea trick of COVID Timewarp or
something, but it feels likefantastic progress.
And it also almost in a wayfeels to me like it's reflecting
(27:35):
the overall landscape of reallyrapidly changing policy in this
area.
I mean, it was only 2010 whenthere were only six states that
even had a Naloxone access lawand by 2017 all states had them.
And so this is just, this is
Dave Humes (27:50):
In varying degrees.
Yeah.
Valerie Earnshaw (27:54):
Is there anything more that you'd like to
say about that or we'recontinuing to break down
barriers?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
And it is interesting, likethere's, we'll have to link to
it Carly in the show notes, butthere's actually a nice map that
shows like how laws are changingand you're right.
Like there's just the, you know,Naloxone access law, but then
there's a whole bunch of otherpolicies that people have had
(28:16):
varying degrees of successes inpassing that helps, you know,
with access.
So anyway, I'm just, before wegot on this call, I was like,
"Carly, like Dave's also workingon some other policy.
I forgot what it is.
I'll have to ask about thestatus of that." So look at,
look at you.
Like it's just needing asignature that's great.
Dave Humes (28:34):
Well, you know, it's , it's been interesting because
this group of bunch of the momsand dads, since we've come into
existence and you have to throwlast year out, we've passed 17
bills, seven of them now overthat time period, seven of them
were specifically our bills.
10 of them were bills that wewere heavily in support of, you
(28:54):
know, made public comment beforecommittee hearings and that sort
of thing.
And right now we have theliability bill and three others
waiting for the governor tosign.
We have a concurrent resolutionthat we're waiting to get
passed.
It's going to declare August31st in Delaware, International
Overdose Awareness day.
(29:14):
And they're going to fly theflags at half staff in honor of
all those people who have beenlost.
So, you know, the billscontinue, but some of them go
very quickly and some of themdon't go so quickly.
And then it was reallyinteresting because when we look
to pass the Good Samaritan bill,back in 2013, we were in June of
the year.
And for people out thereDelaware only has a part time
(29:36):
legislature.
And they finish up at, at theend of June on June 30th and our
bills, didn't start to gothrough committee till June.
And there's only Tuesdays,Wednesdays and Thursdays are the
days where legislature meetscommittee hearings, full
legislature, whatever.
And we're getting through acouple of them who I said to one
of our champions on the bill,like"the end of June, we're
(30:01):
about done here." I said, Isaid,"I guess we're going to
have to wait until next year onthis thing".
And you know, I, I just rememberher looking me in the eye and
she said,"oh, we're going topass this bill!" And I went,
this is going to get done.
And we had our, our finalcommittee hearing on June 26 of
that year.
(30:21):
And usually from committee, thenit goes to the floor of the
respective house and the houseagreed to suspend their rules,
hold a special session so thatthey could vote on this bill and
not have to bring all theseparents who were there to
support the bill back on anotherday.
And you know, so here it went tothe last minute and, you know,
even, even our naloxone bill,the following year, which was
(30:43):
passed at the end of June and Istarted calling June funnel
month.
Cause it seems like crazy.
All the craziness of thelegislative year, all funnels
down to June, you know, nomatter how early you start, but
another bill that-- and I ammost proud of the 911 Good
Samaritan law that we passedhere for, for a lot of different
reasons, but, and I'm certainlyproud of election access law--
(31:05):
But the other one that I'mreally proud of that we passed
in, in 2019 is Opioid Impact FeeBill that took us four and a
half years to pass.
And it's a bill that puts aslight fee on the manufacturers
of all opioids that are sold inthe state of Delaware.
And those fees go into a specialfund stewardship fund to be used
(31:28):
to help people who, I like tosay, have been drug into
addiction.
You know, so Delaware was thefirst state in the nation to
pass this bill.
We had obviously a lot ofpushback from a lot of
representatives of themanufacturers of these opioids
and we knew it was going to bedifficult, but they're very
proud of that bill and the statehas now collected money.
(31:48):
And you know, is looking tospend that money to help some of
these people.
So we're really, really proud ofthat one.
Valerie Earnshaw (31:54):
Maybe this would be a good moment just to
press, to take a beat and talkabout the opioid crisis in
Delaware specifically, and whyit's important to do work in
this area.
So, Dave, I know you and I havebeen on some calls with the
national Institute on drug abusethat has highlighted rates of
overdose in Delaware.
And we've also talked about thisin some of our other episodes
(32:16):
that are coming out this summer,but Delaware is, you know, we're
the second smallest state Ithink in the nation, is that
right?
Carly's our native Delaware areaexpert.
Carly Hill (32:26):
It is true, we are second behind Rhode Island.
Valerie Earnshaw (32:28):
Thank you, Carly, but we are also second
highest in rates of deaths foroverdose.
So Dave, you correct me if I'mwrong and getting this history
about what looks like to me isthat we were not doing well
overall in overdoses, you know,through the 2010s, we were like
creeping up.
We were like for a while, itlooks like we were hanging
(32:49):
around 10th in the nation, butthen fentanyl hits and around
2017, we really pull ahead.
And then we're sort of uphovering with rates of overdose
that are similar to west thatare just after West Virginia.
So it's like West VirginiaDelaware, and then there's a
gap.
And then there's other statesthat at least for the 2019 data.
(33:10):
And when I've dug into it just alittle bit further, I see that,
you know, so it looks likefentanyl is an issue here, which
for folks listening, that's asynthetic opioid, it's just
super duper powerful and it getsmixed in into that heroin, into
the heroin supply.
And so people don't necessarilyknow how much fentanyl they're
getting and that can lead tooverdose.
(33:31):
But then I also saw that we hadjust recently over the weekend,
I found a whole new report, theDEA report, which I, which is
new to me.
So I'll have to dig in furtherto that, but that's the Drug
Enforcement Agency.
And I saw that we also havereally high rates of overdose
due to cocaine, which circlingback to Greg's story about like
cocaine and addiction.
I mean that, you know, that justmakes me think that we don't,
(33:55):
we're not taking cocaineseriously enough, but anyway, so
in sum, my impression is we havealways had an issue with
overdose in Delaware.
It seems to be getting worse,starting in 2017 when fentanyl
comes onto the scene and itlooks like we also are having an
issue with overdose, likerelated to cocaine.
So is that on track?
(34:17):
What am I missing?
Am I getting things wrong?
Dave Humes (34:19):
No.
You know, and I think really westarted to, despite even prior
to 2017, with the introductionto fentanyl.
Fentanyl...
when we talk about heroin herein the state of Delaware, one of
our largest police forces is ourNew Castle County police force.
And they told us that if you goback 15 years ago, the
(34:40):
composition of heroin was suchthat it was 30% pure.
The heroin that they are takingoff the street over the last
couple of years is 70% pure.
And sometimes as high as 90%pure.
So that's bad enough.
But when we talk about fentanyl,fentanyl is 50 to a hundred
times stronger than heroin.
(35:01):
So I was talking to my son theother day and I said, you gotta
help me with all these gigs andeverything.
I said, I understand miles perhour because I drive it, but
help me out with the gigs.
But so just to let peopleunderstand what fentanyl can do.
If you took a package of sugarthat you found in any coffee
shop, there's approximately 300grams of sugar in there.
(35:22):
If that's fentanyl three gramscan kill a person.
So if you're in a room of ahundred people, a sugar packet
of fentanyl can kill a hundredpeople.
And if you're in Delaware, ifyou have a shoe box of fentanyl,
you can take out the state.
Valerie Earnshaw (35:39):
Oh, wow.
That is powerful.
Dave Humes (35:40):
That's how strong this is.
So, you know, one of the thingsI just don't understand about
the dealers are why do you tryto kill your customers?
Don't you want repeat business?
And what the dealers are doing.
They're mixing fentanyl in withheroin.
They're mixing fentanyl in withcocaine, which is, this is
(36:01):
what's in part leading cocaine,overdose deaths.
They're putting the fentanyl inweed.
Because the idea is they want toget people hooked.
And so, you know, it's not FDAapproved stuff, you're buying
off the street, right?
So the, the dealers are tryingto get people hooked so that
they're mixing the fentanyl in.
(36:22):
And it, it's not just thatthey're mixing with other
illegal drugs, but in manyinstances, what they're trying
to do is they take the fentanyland they mix it with fillers and
whatnot and they buy pillpresses and they make it look
like oxy.
Valerie Earnshaw (36:37):
Okay.
Dave Humes (36:38):
So you have that whole thing going on with the
fentanyl, you know, that hasbeen really bad over the last
three or four years.
And again, that's a, that's anational thing.
Certainly, certainly I thinkhere in Delaware, I think 82% of
the overdose deaths have someamount of fentanyl within the
(36:58):
system.
So it's obviously a hugeproblem.
Valerie Earnshaw (37:02):
Yeah.
And then, I mean, COVID has justmade it worse.
So, I mean, you talked aboutthis a little bit earlier when
you were talking about Greg'sstory, but just this...
we, and we've talked about italso just this relationship
between like social isolationand disconnection and overdose
risk.
So first, you know, people whoare more socially isolated are
(37:22):
at greater risk of opioid useand then opioid use leads to
greater social isolation.
And then the other problem withsocial isolation, I think you
also like really hit this on thehead when you said like heroin
is not a party drug, like thepart of a risk of overdose is
using heroin or using theseopioids by yourself.
(37:44):
And as people have been sociallyisolated, as they've been more
likely to be using these drugsat home, then that increases the
risk of overdose.
And I'm not sure what thenumbers look like lately.
We'll have to probably wait andsee.
But, you know, we were at ameeting earlier on in the
epidemic where we saw the ratesfor Delaware and it just, it
looked like very bad news bearslooked pretty scary for
(38:07):
increases in overdose inDelaware.
So I'm sure we'll have to waitfor the dust to settle, to find
out more, but it's not going tobe good.
Dave Humes (38:14):
Yeah.
Last may in Delaware, we tiedfor the greatest number of
overdose deaths in a month.
So that was certainly in partdue to COVID and it looked as if
that would put us on track tofar exceed the overdoses from
the prior year, we did exceedthem, but not nearly as greatly
(38:36):
as expected, I guess the goodnews in all of this is that our
overdoses increased, but therate of overdose decreased.
So we are below double digitsfor the first time, since at
least 2012.
Valerie Earnshaw (38:53):
Oh, that's fantastic.
Dave Humes (38:54):
Yeah.
So that's good.
You know, part of it we canattribute certainly to Naloxone
to Narcan you know as we'vechanged some of these laws.
You know, like in Dave's perfectworld, I'd go buy a pickup truck
and have Valerie drive around.
And I'd be handing out Naloxoneto everybody I saw, you know,
Valerie Earnshaw (39:15):
Yeah.
Can we do that full time?
Like, can I turn retired?
Carly Hill (39:21):
I'm down, I'll buy a trunk.
Let's go.
Dave Humes (39:25):
You know, so we are getting more out there.
There's several organizationssuch as our organization that do
community trainings.
But I have to tell you, thereare some instances I've, I've
been critical of the state'seffort in various things.
But through this whole pandemic,they have done a really good job
of getting Naloxone out into thehands of the public.
(39:47):
And one of them, you know, oneof the studies that we've done
has been produced here inDelaware says that 79% of
overdoses occur in a residence.
Now it's not necessarily anoverdose death.
That's just an overdose, right.
Of those 79% of residences wherethey occur, only 7% have
(40:09):
Naloxone.
So that's why it's important toget more and more of naloxone
out there.
The other thing that comes intoplay as well is with fentanyl.
Typically when, when wedistribute Naloxone, people get
two doses.
So if in the instance where onedose of Narcan isn't working
(40:30):
after about five minutes, andyou've tried a couple other
things you give a second doseand hopefully that brings them
up, you know, get somebreathing, the respiration going
again.
But with fentanyl, it's sostrong sometimes two don't do
it.
And we've heard instances wherethree, four and five, you know,
administrations have been made.
So even if you have your twodoses, sometimes with fentanyl,
(40:52):
you can still be in some toughsituations.
Valerie Earnshaw (40:55):
So Dave, I'd like to kind of, to close us out
by thinking about if folks arelistening and they're interested
in making policy changes relatedto some of these issues in their
state or their localcommunities, or maybe, you know,
something else.
I'm curious as to what kind ofadvice you might give to people
who, who want to be like Daveand make some change.
Dave Humes (41:19):
Well, the first thing is when it comes to, we've
been calling this the publichealth crisis of the 21st
century.
And I'm still going to call itthat despite COVID, because
we're coming out of COVID and atsome point within the next year,
or, you know, hopefully we'llhave it totally under control.
We've been going through thisopioid crisis for two decades
(41:39):
now, you know, so that's why Icall it the public health crisis
of the 21st century.
But the first thing to realizeabout this is you look down in
Washington or you're looking invarious states.
This is one issue that is reallya nonpartisan issue.
And you get support from bothpolitical parties on it.
(42:01):
You can't pass legislationunanimously, you know, if you
don't have the support of bothparties.
So the first thing is tounderstand that this is a
non-partisan issue to getinvolved, you know, get involved
at the local levels is where youwant to get involved.
We're fortunate here inDelaware, as a small state, we
(42:22):
can very easily be in touch withour elected officials or our
state senators our staterepresentatives.
You know, I know in Pennsylvaniait's more difficult.
They have a very largelegislature in Pennsylvania and
they have some 250 legislatorsin PA.
So, and PA is one of 10legislatures that is considered
(42:42):
full-time.
So it's much more difficult, youknow, in a, in a larger state,
but you can still do it.
When we passed our goodSamaritan law here in Delaware,
it was signed by the governor onJuly 2nd.
And on that night, my wife and Iwent to dinner and I got up the
next morning and I startedmaking some phone calls in
Pennsylvania, it's where Gregwas born, right, spent most of
(43:06):
his life.
That's where the detective toldme"we need a 911 or Good
Samaritan law".
That next morning, July 3rd, Istarted making phone calls to
people in Pennsylvania.
And we put together a coalitionin Pennsylvania of nonprofit
groups that we found in allcorners of the state.
And we put that together and ittook longer because again,
Pennsylvania has a largelegislature.
(43:27):
We started it in July.
We started bringing peopletogether.
We finally passed a bill thatincorporated both community
access to Naloxone and 911 GoodSamaritan, all in one bill.
And it was finally signed bythen governor Tom Corbett on
September 30th, 2014.
So we did it in little statesand we did it in large states,
(43:48):
but you know, what you reallywant to do is you want one to
find out who your locallegislators are.
If you can, you know, you wantto try and set up meetings with
them.
In some states, they havemonthly, you know, constituent
coffees, you know, which isyou're going to be there with a
bunch of people, but you'regoing to get some access and
you're going to get some facetime.
Don't be afraid to seek themout, you know, send emails to
(44:09):
them, trying to, you know, get ameeting with them.
And, you know, you want to berespectful.
I mean, everybody has theiropinion of legislators
sometimes, but you know, youwant to be respectful because
you know, most of them work veryhard.
They spend a lot of time offhours and whatnot, you know,
doing things for yourconstituents and everything.
(44:29):
So there are a couple of thingsthat you can do.
I think you want to try andtouch base with your media.
I think as you try to passlegislation in the instance of
addiction issues, I always lookat it as sort of a two-prong
thing.
I look at it as, you know, oldpoops like me and younger
people.
I get a lot of my informationfrom the newspaper.
(44:51):
So you want to hit new localnewspapers, local media, and try
to get them to cover thesestories a little bit.
And then you want to develop asocial media platform so that
you can reach, you know, youngergenerations.
People might, you know, forinstance, my son Dave's age, so
you can reach them there, youstart creating awareness.
You know, of the problem, youknow, there are a couple of
(45:13):
things that you can do right offthe bat.
I always suggest that whenyou're looking at the media, you
try to find their healthreporters.
Valerie Earnshaw (45:19):
Okay.
Dave Humes (45:21):
Yeah.
And every time we've tried topass these laws, we, you know, a
lot of instances in some states,they want to do it as a criminal
justice issue.
We've always tried to make it ahealth and social services or
health and human services, ahuman issue rather than a law
enforcement issue.
But we all always want to buildconsensus with law enforcement.
(45:42):
We've been fortunate here inDelaware.
Our law enforcement has beenvery progressive in addressing
this issue.
And, and early on, I rememberwhen a police chief saying we
can't handcuff our way out ofthis.
Again, a very large policedepartment, New Castle County
here in Delaware.
They started a program a coupleof years ago, it's called hero
help.
And if you need help withaddiction issues, you can go
(46:05):
into the police station, requesthelp, and they will help you.
As long as you have no seriouscharges against you, you have no
major felonies.
They will literally take you todetox.
They will follow up.
They will see about getting somepost detox care and whatnot.
So, you know, we're seeing a lotof progress on that front with
law enforcement.
So we we've been fortunatethere, but you know, you want to
(46:27):
build a coalition of partnersand that includes both ends of
the spectrum.
You know, you want, you want totry and make friends with people
who seemingly are opposed tothese ideas.
Valerie Earnshaw (46:39):
So this is super helpful, I mean, so I'm
hearing a lot of coalitionbuilding I'm hearing like making
direct contact with thepolicymakers who are
representing you.
I'm hearing, you know, earlieron in your story, when you were
talking about crafting theseemails, I'm hearing a lot about
like sharing personal storiesand reasons as well.
You know, getting word out,educating your community.
(47:01):
I'm curious as to how scientistswho are, you know, local
scientists like me, or, youknow, scientists who might be
really working in areas thatyou're trying to advocate
around, maybe nationally, howthey can be helpful for these,
like for these efforts.
And I'm also curious, you know,I know that you're, you know,
(47:22):
you're pulling in great data andyou're pulling in great science,
like, as you are also advocatingfor these changes as well, and
sort of, where are you findingthat science?
Like, how are you accessingthat?
Like along the way.
Are scientists calling you Dave?
We should be calling you...
Dave Humes (47:41):
We do.
And that's how you and I, youand I came into contact with one
another.
So it's time for Dave to pullout another one of his
collection of quotes.
I love this one,"nothing aboutus without us", early on, we saw
policy being driven from the topdown and policy needs to be
driven from the trenches.
Scientific data collection andwhatnot needs to be driven from
(48:06):
the trenches.
You know, I've often said thatwith some of the policies coming
down, people are sitting saying"this is what we think they
need.
Let's give it to them." And Isaid,"why don't you ask them
what it is they need?" So, youknow, it's the same thing with
the science community, you know,what are things that are needed?
What science can do.
(48:27):
I think science can look intostudies of how we recover.
You know, let's take a look atdifferent types of MAT, you
know, Medical AssistedTreatment.
Let's look at methadone, let'slook at buprenorphine, let's
look at naltrexone and let'slook at abstinence.
The four main things that areout there what's more effective.
(48:48):
Can we find out one being moreeffective than the other?
I volunteered for several yearswith an IOP group, which is
intensive outpatient program.
And it was mainly younger peoplewho were sent there by the drug
diversion courts and veryun-scientific sample, certainly
small sample size, justanecdotal my personal
experience.
(49:08):
The people who progressed bestto the IOP to get their charges
dropped and everything were theones that were on naltrexone.
And I just have a strange samplesize there that seemed to work
or, you know, is that applicablein real life?
So that's an area that I wouldlike to see more science
involved.
One of the big fights when welooked at Naloxone and it's
(49:32):
still out there, you know, wehear, oh, when you administer
Naloxone, you're going to wakeup a raging beast and that
person's going to come out of itand rip your heart out and
whatnot.
You know, things like that havebeen said by legislators, it's
not an exact quote, but it'sclose.
And my contention as anon-medical person.
Is can this happen?
(49:52):
Yeah certainly it can happen.
But when we talk about the layperson, administration of
naloxone like we're doing out inthe community, this is
relatively small dosagescompared to somebody being taken
care of medically and getting anIV of Naloxone, which may put
them into a violent reaction.
So I would love to see somestudies there to show people.
(50:15):
I've seen five abstracts, again,small sample size that basically
say, does it happen?
Yeah, but it only happens 7% ofthe time.
As long as we're talking about aviolent reaction where there's,
you know, hands on, onsomebody's shouting and
screaming that you ruined theirhigh is abusive, but you know,
it's certainly not, you know,it's not violent.
(50:37):
Another study I think that wouldbe great from scientists is
looking into safe injectionsites.
Valerie Earnshaw (50:44):
Yes, yeah
Dave Humes (50:44):
When I talk about safe injection sites, I don't
speak for our organization.
I speak for myself on this onebecause we haven't decided how
we're going to handle it.
I'm in favor of safe injectionsites.
They've been doing it in Canadafor quite a while.
Now they have a pretty goodtrack record.
I think in, in 20 some yearsthey have only lost one person
to overdose in 20 years and youhave to go"wow", there was, um,
(51:09):
some, some of the listeners haveprobably heard about the Safe
House in Philadelphia, who havebeen looking into establishing
safe injection sites inPhiladelphia.
And I'm very pleased to say thathere in Delaware, the attorney
general joined Safe Houses intheir suit to approve safe
injection sites.
So I think that's another areathat could be studied.
(51:31):
Several years ago, and I haven'tdone any follow up since, but
there was a doctor at ScrippsInstitute out in California.
I think his name was Dr.
Janda and he was actuallyworking on vaccines that people
could be vaccinated againstopioid addiction.
And he also felt as if it couldapply to alcohol and that sort
(51:54):
of thing as well, where he is asfar as clinical trials or as he
got an approval of clinicaltrials.
And, you know, if that's thescience, we can, we can inject
people at birth, to rejectopioids or something like that.
That's something else thatcertainly we can look into, but
no, I, again, I just think it'sreally important to talk to the
(52:15):
people who have gone through it,you know, to get their feedback
and get their suggestions.
Valerie Earnshaw (52:21):
I feel like you just mapped out like several
careers worth of, of science forfolks.
So that's really helpful, youknow, and to me, you know, what
I'm really hearing here is acall for more like community
engaged and maybe participatoryaction research is sometimes
like what folks call this in thefield, really this idea of, you
know, you knocked it out with"nothing about us without us".
(52:44):
That's a call that scientistshave been hearing like for
decades and in the HIV movementand in other areas.
And I think it's so importantfor me to keep hearing that for
others of us who are listening,who are scientists to keep
hearing that because, you know,you don't get into studying this
area just for fun, you get intostudying this area and doing
(53:06):
work in this area because youwant to help people.
And I think it's a reallypowerful thing to hear from you,
Dave, that, well, if you want tobe helpful for people, you have
to talk to them to hear aboutwhat's going on in their lives
and also to learn about, youknow, how am I going to know
what policy issues the moversand shakers are making in my,
(53:27):
you know, in my area, unless I've talked to them and find out
like, oh, there's some interestin, you know, and again, this is
you, but i n safe injectionsites, well, that's interesting.
Like what can I do to be helpfulin building an e vidence b ase
that will help people tounderstand that this is a good
thing.
So that's really helpful.
And it's a great call to actionfor folks who are listening.
(53:48):
Dave, I really admire yourleadership and your advocacy.
I'm so glad that you got greedywith the l ife-saving like, it's
just so tremendous.
And I really can't wait to getthis truck to go just full time,
distributing Naloxone inDelaware.
And t hen we're going to go upto Pennsylvania and just go like
(54:10):
nationwide.
I think that this is going to betremendous.
Dave Humes (54:13):
One last stolen quote.
Valerie Earnshaw (54:15):
Okay.
Yes, please.
Dave Humes (54:17):
"The job of the citizen is to keep their mouth
open" It's a quote from agentleman by the name of Gunther
Grass who is a German.
Valerie Earnshaw (54:27):
What a good one.
Will you please keep your mouthopen and we'll do the same.
Carly Hill (54:30):
We'll shout louder behind you, Dave.
Thanks Dave.
Valerie Earnshaw (54:42):
Thanks to the Stigma and Health Inequities lab
at the University of Delawarefor their help at the podcast,
including Sarah Lopez, MollyMarine, James Wallace, and
Ashley Roberts.
Carly Hill (54:52):
Thanks to city girl for the music as always be sure
to check us out on Instagram@sexdrugsscience, and stay up to
date on new episodes by clickingsubscribe.
Valerie Earnshaw (55:00):
Thanks to all of you for listening.
[Music]
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