The number of Mainers who died from a drug overdose dropped slightly last year, but the average number of fatal overdoses was still almost one a day.
With those numbers in mind, more than 60 people came to downtown Bangor on Saturday night as a reminder that much more still needs to be done to address the opioid crisis.
To mark International Overdose Awareness Day, which happens every year on Aug. 31, people spent the afternoon using chalk to write remembrances in the middle of Pickering Square for those who died from drug-related causes. They also argued for pushing past the shame of drug addiction to love and help those affected by it.
One of the chalked messages included the name of a man who died last October at the age of 27. “Narcan would’ve said his life,” said the message, which accompanied by a couple of red and yellow flowers.
[Fatal drug overdoses dropped in Maine last year, but still claimed hundreds of lives]
Others attending event wore black shirts that featured the image of a syringe and proclaimed the need to “Keep Calm and Carry Naloxone.”
Some local groups also handed out kits of naloxone, the overdose-reversing drug also known by the brand name Narcan, along with slices of pizza, bottled water, condoms and brochures stressing the importance of using clean needles and getting tested for diseases.
The goal of the event was to “remember those we’ve lost and work to end overdoses,” said Maddy Magnuson, director of harm reduction services at the Healthy Equity Alliance, a group with offices in Bangor, Ellsworth, Machias and Belfast that offers public health resources such as needle exchanges and case management for people with HIV/AIDS.
Magnuson and other organizers said it’s very likely Mainers know someone who struggles with addiction and pleaded that it not be seen as a moral failing.
“People who use drugs deserve love, compassion and dignity,” said Richard, a volunteer with the group Needlepoint Sanctuary that hands out needles and naloxone, who only agreed to provide a pseudonym. “They’re your friends and family and cops and bosses and landlords. It doesn’t discriminate.”
Richard, a 27-year-old from Newport, declined to provide his real name because police have recently handed out no-trespass orders to members of his group and charged one of them with illegal possession of hypodermic apparatus, preventing their needle exchange from operating in Pickering Square.
[Belfast police chief once doubted Narcan, but saved lives have changed his mind]
The event on Saturday culminated with a performance of live music and short talks from people who have been directly affected by the opioid crisis.
One of them, Shelly Yankowsky, recounted that both her sons, Adam and Sean, died from drug overdoses and imparted three lessons to the crowd.
She said that however difficult it may be, families shouldn’t enable their loved ones to keep abusing drugs by giving them money or bailing them out in other ways. She urged people to “plant seeds” for their loved ones to recover by letting “them know that when they are ready to get better you are there for them.’
Finally, she told the audience, “Love them unconditionally. Let them know that no matter what, you will always love them. They will mess things up a lot. Love them anyway. Tell them every chance you get that you love them. There may be a day that you can’t tell them that anymore.”
In closing, she said, “They are people. They are your people. They are all our people.”
Related: The opioid crisis in Maine
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