Nestled between the vending machines for tickets and bottles of pop at Chicago’s Jefferson Park Transit Center, there’s a new vending machine that can save a life.
LSSI is one of several organizations that helped bring free NARCAN Nasal Spray vending machines to five Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) stations across the city during a six-month pilot program. NARCAN is the brand name for Naloxone, a safe medication that reverses an opioid-involved overdose.
“If you see someone slumped over and they’re not responding, you can save their life. This will save them,” said Monica Lopez, a community nurse practitioner for LSSI’s Medication- Assisted Recovery (MAR) Program. She specializes in addiction medicine and has first-hand experience caring for patients who have reversed an overdose because of NARCAN.
“We’re just trying to promote it to the point where people aren’t scared anymore, that it’s not stigmatized,” Lopez added. “I think that a lot of people are more open to receiving information and understanding how it works and willing to help others.”
The idea for the pilot started about two years ago when the West Side Heroin/Opioid Task Force received data from the Chicago Department of Public Health that showed overdoses were happening on the CTA. Pastor Fanya Burford-Berry is the director of the task force and said partnering with local organizations like LSSI is important because it expands care for someone struggling with addiction.
“When our partner agencies are out with us, such as Lutheran Social Services of Illinois, if someone says, ‘I desire more and I need treatment right away,’ then we can say, Lutheran Social Services is right here to do those wraparounds services, because you guys do something more in-depth than we do. We’re just like the first encounter,” said Burford-Berry. “That’s how this project came together, all these moments of God working with people who care about people who use drugs.”
The Jefferson Park machine has only been operational for a week, and it’s already half-empty, meaning people are using it. LSSI’s adoption of the machine included participation in a resource fair on September 22 and returning to the machine monthly for community outreach and education about our programs.
State Rep. Lindsey LaPointe represents the 19th district and spoke about the importance of these machines while accepting LSSI’s Legislator of the Year Award on September 16.
“I guarantee you we have never had a NARCAN vending machine anywhere near the far northwest side of Chicago,” LaPointe said. “And that is incredibly important.”
CTA officials explained in a previous press conference that the locations were determined using community input and data on opioid-related emergencies.
The five stations with NARCAN vending machines include:
- Jefferson Park Blue Line
- Harlem/Lake Green Line
- Central Park Pink Line
- 47th Red Line
- Wilson Red/Purple Line
