NORTHWEST ARKANSAS (KFSM) -- The Fayetteville Police Department will soon be equipped with the life-saving drug Narcan.
"We have not seen a lot of overdoses in the Fayetteville area, however nationally the opioid epidemic has exploded causing a lot of the accidental overdoses on prescription pills,” Cpl. Greg Dawson said.
Dawson said not only will this help those overdosing, it will also help officers who get exposed to these drugs.
He said synthetic opioids such as Carfentanil are extremely dangerous and more officers are accidentally exposed.
“Officers have been known to inhale it through the nose while serving search warrants. Just bumping a table with either Fentanyl or Carfentanil on the table stirs dust up and it actually sends officers into medical emergencies,” he said.
The Bentonville Police Department said right now they do not have plans for their officers to carry Narcan and Gene Page said that's because they have Narcan on every one of their ambulances with trained EMT’s who know how to use it.
“In our city, we have five ambulances at any given time that are strategically placed throughout the city to speed up that process. Statistically right now they arrive on the medical calls before law enforcement. So, we are going to keep the distribution through them first,” Page said.
Bentonville police said if opioid overdoses do become an bigger issue in the city, then they will look at funding a program for officers to carry Narcan.
Springdale Police Department said they have plans for officers to carry Narcan, but do not have a timeline. They said officers carrying it will be more of a proactive measure.
Rogers Police Department said Narcan is in all patrol vehicles and officers are trained how to use it.
The Benton County Sheriff’s Office said Narcan has been deployed with all sworn deputies who have successfully completed the training program. This has been there policy since Sept. 2017.
The Washington County Sheriff’s Office was not able to provide an answer as of Tuesday (Jan. 30)