Moment police inject life-saving drug into homeless man after fearing he’d had heroin overdose… only to realise he was simply ASLEEP
- West Midlands Police has trained its officers in the use of anti-narcotic naloxone
- The drug can reverse the effects of a heroin overdose if given in a timely fashion
- Officers thought a man in the doorway of a House of Fraser had overdosed
- The man was given the drug and put into an ambulance having been asleep
Dramatic footage shows the first time UK police inject a heroin addict with a potentially life-saving drug – only to discover the man was just asleep.
West Midlands Police is the first force in the country to train officers how to use naloxone which can reverse the effects of a heroin overdose.
Bodycam footage showed the moment officers in Birmingham administered the drug to a suspected heroin addict who had passed out in the street.
Police officers decided to administer a dose of naxolone to a man found sleeping in the doorway of Birmingham’s House of Fraser believing he had succumbed to an overdose
Bodycam footage shows one of the officers preparing to inject the man who is lying prone
The video shows two officers injecting the man who was lying on the floor outside the House of Fraser store on July 15.
But after the man was loaded into an ambulance and regained consciousness it emerged he was a rough sleeper who had nodded off.
Police confirmed it was the first time the drug had been used in the UK.
Despite mistakenly using the drug, it was not harmful to the man who was released from hospital hours later.
Naloxone is an emergency antidote for overdoses caused by heroin and other drugs including methadone, morphine and fentanyl.
The initiative followed a report by Police and Crime Commissioner David Jamieson which revealed that every three days someone dies from drug poisoning in the West Midlands.
The main life-threating effects of these drugs are that they slow down and can stop breathing. Naloxone blocks this effect and reverses the breathing difficulties temporarily to buy time for the ambulance to arrive.
Chief Inspector Jane Bailey said: ‘This is a really innovative and exciting initiative as we continue to tackle the issue of drugs and offer help and support to those at risk from drug overdoses. ‘Officers will be able to instantly administer the life-saving drug should they come across anyone experiencing an opiate overdose while out and about in the city’
Chief Inspector Jane Bailey, the force’s drug lead, said: ‘This is a really innovative and exciting initiative as we continue to tackle the issue of drugs and offer help and support to those at risk from drug overdoses.
‘Officers will be able to instantly administer the life-saving drug should they come across anyone experiencing an opiate overdose while out and about in the city.
‘A sight which has sadly been experienced by officers who have had to call for paramedics to assist others under the influence of controlled drugs.
‘While this is not about trying to interfere with the fantastic work of our ambulance colleagues, who of course would still attend and deal with the patient, it’s about being able to offer the initial fast aid and help save a life.
‘We also hope that this intervention can assist people with taking steps to get support from our specialist drug agency colleagues in an effort to turn their lives around.’
Naxolone is widely used in the United States which is also battling a serious opiate problem