International Overdose Awareness Day is Saturday, Aug. 31. In observance of this day, a group of parents who have personally experienced overdose loss decided to run their own billboard campaign. These parents wanted a way to both memorialize their child and educate the community about illicit drugs, especially Fentanyl. The parents campaign expresses that fentanyl has stolen their children’s lives and also seeks to educate others of the prevalence and danger of this synthetic drug.
These grief-stricken families want to encourage non-profit, for profit, Hamilton County government, the city of Chattanooga, educators and others to find proactive ways to educate parents, teens and the general public about this deadly poison.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is approximately 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine.
It is inexpensive, widely available, highly addictive and comes in a variety of colors, shapes and forms, including powders and pills. Drug traffickers are increasingly mixing fentanyl with other illicit drugs to drive addiction. Many victims of fentanyl poisoning were unaware they ingested fentanyl.
This is the case of Allyson Fullam, who passed in 2021 to three times the lethal dose of fentanyl in a single pill. She is featured on one of the billboards located on Highway 58. Her mother, Margaret Fullam, hopes that “telling of my 26 year-old daughter’s story might help others be aware of this deadly drug.”
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that more than 107,543 people died last year from a drug poisoning or overdose. According to a study from the Rand Cooperation, 42 percent of Americans know someone who has died from a drug-related death.
“The shift to synthetic drugs has resulted in the most dangerous and deadly drug crisis in United States history. The Faces of Fentanyl exhibit at DEA Headquarters stands as a solemn reminder of the toll this drug has taken on families all across the country, and it compels us to continue our fight against the cartels fueling this crisis,” said DEA Administrator Anne Milgram. According to the DEA, seven out of every 10 pills they confiscate contains a lethal dose of fentanyl.
The safety of our teens is more critical than ever. Every week an average of 22 U.S. teens lose their lives to drug overdoses, driven by the Fentanyl crisis. The overdose rate for 14-18 year-olds has increased to 5.2 deaths per 100,000 according to recent research published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
A local community advocate and mother, Brenda Purcell, lost her 30-year-old son, Jarrod, to fentanyl in 2019. She wants the community to know, “It is my understanding that provisional data for 2024 shows 95 suspected overdose deaths with 63 percent being fentanyl related, which is 66.32 percent. While we celebrate overdose numbers being somewhat down, that does not mean that we have fixed this crisis. People are still living with addiction and dangerous drugs are still flowing freely; we cannot let up on the efforts now.”
These parents encourage everyone to join them on National Fentanyl Prevention and Drug Overdose Awareness Day by remembering and honoring the lives lost through this horrible crisis. The billboards featuring these parents' beloved children can be seen throughout the Chattanooga area. Information and free resources are available through the DEA at https://www.dea.gov/onepill.
Margaret Fullam
**Resources:
https://cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2024/20240515.htm
https://www.rand.org/.news/press/2024/02/21.html
http://www.DEA.gov
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Thank for taking your own tragedy and grief, and turning your loss into an awareness effort to hopefully save young lives from the poison entering our nation. To the parents group responsible for this billboard ad campaign, you have done amazing work in this prevention and awareness effort.
It is beyond comprehension and horrifying to read the number of lives being lost to fentanyl poison. Awareness, prevention, and treatment are where resources should be spent.
Every young person in this nation is at risk for overdose with fentanyl being added to all street drugs. I believe that the government is reporting that 74,702 people were killed from street fentanyl alone last year. This is beyond anything in our lifetime.
Your effort is hugely worthy of pursuit to save lives.
Thank you parents for using your own resources to raise awareness. Perhaps, local media could also post your prevention ads. It seems they would as public service.
May love and peace be with the parents of this prevention effort.
April Eidson