ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The Alexandria City School Board voted Thursday evening to make naloxone available in schools immediately in hopes of preventing opioid overdoses.
ACPS nurses, health personnel and trained staff will be able to "administer naloxone or other opioid antagonist" during an emergency when an overdose needs to be reversed. School district staff said city partners are training school nurses and staff on how to use the kits provided by the Virginia Department of Health.
Naloxone, approved by the Food and Drug Administration, is the medication that can be administered to reverse an opioid overdose. It is commonly referred to as Narcan.
ACPS officials said this had been in the works for a while, but it's timely now to get it inside schools as quickly as possible amid reported overdoses from counterfeit Percocet pills laced with Fentanyl.
Police believe the laced drugs took the lives of two Prince William County teens last week, and are suspected of causing at least eight other overdoses in young people in Northern Virginia over the last month, six of those reported in Alexandria.
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On Wednesday the City of Alexandria Police Department warned residents about a "spike in suspected fentanyl-related overdoses" specifically in school-aged children. Police said between April 1 and May 1, six children under the age of 17 suffered from opioid overdoses, and many were revived by first responders who used Narcan. According to police, many of the children had taken a counterfeit pill that appeared to be Percocet but was laced with fentanyl, making it up to 100 times more deadly.
The warning from Alexandria came hours after the Prince William County Police Department announced the seizure of several guns and more than 5,000 suspected counterfeit fentanyl-laced Percocet pills.
The Prince William County Police Department also announced the arrest of four men between the ages of 19 and 23, charged with crimes ranging from giving a firearm to a minor to possession with intent to distribute.
RELATED: After 2 Virginia teens died from counterfeit Percocet pills, police seize thousands of laced pills
The City of Alexandria Health Department currently offers free Narcan — which is the brand that packages naloxone — to residents. To obtain the free Narcan, call 703-746-4888 or email opioids@alexandriava.gov. The health department also offers free fentanyl test strips, which can reduce the risk of overdosing. To get free test strips, city residents can email their name and address to opioids@alexandriava.gov.