Bags of salt were used during the Partnership Douglas County’s Parent’s Night presentation to demonstrate how lethal fentanyl can be. One bag contained 14 grams of salt, which, if fentanyl, could kill 4-6 average adults and the other contained three tablespoons which could kill 30 people more than 2 million times.
Worst-case scenarios created an opportunity to educate on what could happen, like the incident at Douglas High School on March 26 where vape pens tested positive for THC, Ecstasy, fentanyl and other opioids.
“We dodged a tragedy,” said Juvenile Probation Officer Senior Dan Hamer. “But this is obviously an issue that’s going to confront us more often.”
In response to the incident, Partnership Douglas County hosted a parent’s night on Monday at the Douglas County Community & Senior Center to educate the community about the growing prevalence of dangerous drugs like the ones discovered in the vapes, and others including carfentanil and pink cocaine; a particularly common party drug among youth and to introduce their new program HEART, which provides resources for youth and families to address mental health, drug usage and prevention.
Partnership Douglas County also presented HEART to Douglas County School Board trustees on Thursday seeking an interagency agreement for the youth program for student behavior health assessments and services between the school district and Partnership Douglas County..The board took no action and asked for further information
HEART stands for Hope, Empowerment, Assistance, Recovery, Transformation. The program is designed to empower youth facing challenges by providing support and essential resources, through direct intervention, personalized care, and strong community partnerships to ensure youth have the tools for a brighter future.
“HEART has been in the works since November after a string of youth passed from substance usage related incidents across Northern Nevada,” said Partnership Executive Director Daria Singer.
Singer said the program is an opportunity to provide additional resources during a time when it is needed the most. She indicated 25 people attended the Parents Night.
“The timing of it all presented the perfect opportunity to present HEART,” she said. “We want this program to be a resource for families in Douglas at no cost to them.”
Mental health and drug use often go hand-in-hand, and by addressing one the other can be prevented.
“You can’t combat drug usage without addressing underlying mental health,” said Singer.
In teens and young adults, it is often a communication barrier where adults are not understanding their needs or cries for help.
“A lot of them don’t feel comfortable talking to their parents, or they don’t feel comfortable talking about it at school,” said Singer.
Another issue is peer pressure. Statistics and surveys presented during the event revealed that kids are more likely to experiment with substances or have risky behaviors because they want to feel accepted and understood.Â
Hamer said being aware of sudden changes in a teen’s behavior can be a sign of drug use or an underlying mental health issue.
“When introduced to this idea, which came first? Was there an underlying mental health condition that precipitated drug use,” said Hamer. “We don’t know, we have to investigate that.”
Hamer said adolescence is challenging as it is and being aware of and recognizing social, emotional, and cognitive needs and changes while providing a safe, supportive, and open communication with your child is important for preventing mental health issues and drug use.
“And that’s the whole point of why we are here, is to provide the education and awareness so vyou can have those conversations, whether it’s your own kids, your nieces or nephews, or other kids in the community, so we can change these statistics,” said Singer.