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EMS agency releases emotional video to fight heroin epidemic

The video includes audio of a 911 call from a woman who finds her son unconscious and overdosing on heroin

By EMS1 Staff

ST. CHARLES COUNTY, Mo. — An ambulance company launched an anti-heroin campaign, which includes an emotionally charged video re-enacting a heroin overdose call.

“The video was produced to give originally students — but the public at large — a look at the eyes of our paramedics at what they see when they go on an overdose call,” Kyle Gaines with the St. Charles County Ambulance District told FOX2.

The video includes audio of a 911 call placed by mother who finds her 21-year-old son unconscious and overdosing on heroin.

“You can hear the pain in her voice” Gaines said. “That’s when our paramedics and other emergency responders on scene have to do the always unpleasant task of telling a mother, a father, a sister, a brother, whoever is on scene that their loved one did not survive.”

Last year, SCCAD responded to an average of one overdose call a day. Gaines said the video aims to educate the community of the dangers and outcomes of heroin addiction.

“We need people to continue those conversations around the dinner table, have those conversations with your kids, around the dinner table so that this remains front of mind for everybody, he said.