18 Jul Stay Hydrated and Carry Narcan’ Parties are back, and so is panic about fentanyl-laced cocaine.
In the middle of the N train on the last Saturday night in June, someone in a crop top was shouting to the riders like a subterranean town crier: “Stay hydrated and carry Narcan! Check your shit!” Partying in New York was back for Pride weekend, but with an asterisk: Be careful with your drugs.
For every DJ set on offer, bars seemed to be holding training sessions on how to administer Narcan, the nasal spray that can reverse opioid overdoses. The host of a house party I went to in Chinatown dutifully informed her guests that the Narcan was located in the kitchen should anyone need it, as if she was pointing out the bathroom. At a daytime event at H0L0, a music venue in Queens, a harm-reductionist named Dave Justice gave out his last test strips, pieces of paper that can be used to check injectables, powders, and pills for the presence of fentanyl, the extremely potent synthetic opioid. Though illegal fentanyl is overwhelmingly responsible for accidental overdose deaths involving heroin, Justice explained that attendees were specifically worried about fentanyl and cocaine. “Someone overdosed on some fentanyl and cocaine out in Brooklyn a couple weeks ago,” he said. He had heard it was a person “core to a bunch of different friend groups across Brooklyn,” but knew nothing more.
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