San Diego’s homeless often consider themselves part of a collective community, but as the fentanyl epidemic rages on in San Diego and the U.S., each is another’s keeper now more than ever.
Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid 50 times stronger than morphine, is killing greater numbers of unsheltered citizens each year, leading some homeless people to do what they can to protect their unsheltered neighbors.
An unhoused San Diego woman named Shadow doesn't think a homeless person's life isn't worth saving.
"I know that if I can help save somebody’s life I’m going to do it. Regardless of what the situation may be," Shadow said.
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That's why she carries Narcan, the opioid overdose-reversing drug, with her whenever she can.
“If you catch it in time, the person wakes up. I haven’t lost anybody yet," she said.
Shadow has been living on the street, mostly downtown near the Gaslamp Quarter, for half her life. She said she’s either administered Narcan or gotten someone else a dose 12 times in the last month. Oftentimes, in tent communities on the sidewalks, someone will yell out that they need it.
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"It happens a lot," Shadow said. "Not as often as people would ask for a cigarette, but it does happen a lot.”
In 2020 The San Diego County Medical Examiner’s office reported 85 fentanyl overdose cases in the homeless community. The next year the number jumped to over 190.
"It’s not the typical drug people have been using for a long time and it’s hard to measure," Tara Stamos-Buesig, CEO of the Harm Reduction Coalition of San Diego (HRCSD), explained.
Stamos-Buesig works on the streets and with county government to distribute Narcan. She was once unsheltered for 20 years and a drug user during that time.
"Narcan should be available to everyone. It should be in everybody’s home medicine cabinets, in your car," Stamos-Buesig said.
If you ask Shadow who should carry Narcan, you’ll get the same answer.
"Anybody that cares for other people at all. I would save a life regardless," she said.
