The chaotic scene at the small house along Bircher Avenue was something not seen before by South St. Paul police and first responders.
As they pulled up around 10:30 p.m. Saturday, officers spotted three men lying on the ground outside. The men — between 25 and 28 years of age — were unresponsive and not breathing from overdosing after ingesting suspected opioids. Two other men were inside, also overdosing.
Emergency personnel began life-saving measures, including the use of Narcan, a drug that reverses the effects of an overdose.
“It was overwhelming,” South St. Paul Police Chief Bill Messerich said Monday. “You had five people that are near cardiac arrest. Typically, you see one.”
Then, a sixth man collapsed.
And an officer with Inver Grove Heights police, who were called in to assist at the scene, soon reported having exposure-related symptoms. He, too, was rushed to an area hospital.
Inver Grove Heights Police Chief Melissa Chiodo said Monday the officer was not exposed to the drug.
“We were lucky,” she said.
On Monday, South St. Paul residents near the home said a woman recently bought it and moved in with her son earlier this month. When contacted Monday, the woman said she did not want to comment about what happened.
ALL EXPECTED TO SURVIVE
Messerich said the six men are recovering and expected to survive. He said it was yet unclear what drug they had taken. “Tests are being done,” he said.
Chiodo said the early belief is the drug the men apparently consumed could have been cut with fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that people have been adding to heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana.
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As a drug, fentanyl “suppresses your respiratory system and can cause respiratory arrest,” said Dakota County sheriff’s Capt. Chris Melton, commander of the county’s drug task force.
It’s common to see fentanyl in the drugs they’re seizing, Melton said. He didn’t have information Monday about whether that was the drug at work in the South St. Paul overdoses; he said they won’t know until testing is completed.
Fentanyl is being made overseas in clandestine labs, though people have no idea about “the potency of it and whether it’s made correctly,” Melton added.
ON THE WATCH FOR MORE CASES
The South St. Paul overdoses appear isolated “so far, but certainly that drug dealer didn’t bring in enough for just six people,” Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension Superintendent Drew Evans said Monday.
“We will keep watching out to see if there are additional spikes,” he said.
In St. Paul, EMS personnel administered Narcan to nine people this weekend — more than in recent weekends (they used it four times the weekend before, one the weekend before that and two a weekend earlier), but there was no indication the cases were connected, said Ken Adams, deputy chief of emergency medical services for the St. Paul Fire Department. They happened at various times and in different parts of the city.
“Just because Narcan was given doesn’t necessarily mean it was an opioid overdose,” Adams said.
Narcan is an anti-overdose drug for opioids, but first responders can also use it if they encounter a person who is unconscious for unknown reasons. If the problem turns out not to be an opioid overdose, Narcan has no effect and doesn’t hurt the person.
In Dakota County, Melton said he knew offhand of 12 to 14 drug overdoses in the last couple of months, of which five or six were fatal.
In 2017, the latest year figures are available, there were 422 overdose deaths in Minnesota involving opioids. The biggest increase involved synthetic opioids other than methadone (predominantly fentanyl), which jumped from 31 overdose deaths in 2011 to 184 in 2017.
‘BAD BATCH’ A MISNOMER, OFFICIAL SAYS
Local officials have alerted the public in the past about overdose concerns.
In 2017, as soon as the Hennepin County medical examiner’s office realized there were a cluster of deaths connected to a drug that was new to the area, they quickly met with law enforcement and held a news conference, said Carolyn Marinan, Hennepin County spokeswoman.
Officials announced a powerful opioid, carfentanil, had caused at least five overdose-related deaths in the state at that time, though the number continued to grow.
The head of the Drug Enforcement Agency in Minnesota isn’t aware of a connection between the six people overdosing in South St. Paul and other cases, said Emily Murray, public information officer for the DEA’s Omaha division, which includes Minnesota.
When a group of people overdose at the same time, it doesn’t necessarily mean a drug is laced with a dangerous substance. Calling it a “bad batch” is a misnomer because “any illicit drugs you’re putting in your body are a bad batch,” Murray said.
People may overdose because they’re new drug users and they get too high of a dose, or they could be switching from one street drug they usually use to a different one, according to Murray.
PROGRAM COULD HELP SPOT OVERDOSE SPIKES
There’s been a push to roll out the Overdose Detection Mapping Application Program (ODMAP), which identifies spikes in drug overdoses, to law enforcement agencies in Minnesota this year, Evans, the BCA superintendent, said.
So far, 83 of about 430 departments in the state have agreed to participate. Departments in Dakota, Ramsey, Washington, Anoka and Hennepin counties have signed up, but the counties don’t have complete participation yet.
ODMAP provides real-time information about non-fatal and fatal overdoses, which allows communities to respond if there is a spike, Evans said. Officials could alert first responders and staff at emergency rooms, and have law enforcement working to identify where the drugs are coming from to get them off the streets, Evans said.
“We’re not going to arrest our way out of the problem,” Evans said. “We’re looking at programs through education, prevention and treatment, so we can help keep Minnesotans safe.”
