JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – On Wednesday, eight Jacksonville first responders were given Back the Blue Awards for saving an infant suffering from a fentanyl overdose.
RELATED: 7-month-old rescued after suspected fentanyl overdose at Spring Park apartment complex
Attorney General Ashley Moody was with Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters, Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department Chief Jacob Blanton, and Project Opioid North Florida Director of Advocacy T.J. Ward to present the awards.
On June 5, first responders were called for an unresponsive 7-month-old in a Jacksonville apartment complex.
“Adults I see every day on the common, an infant that was a first one,” said Officer Isolina Langston.
Langston and her partner were first on the scene. She took the baby from someone’s arms, put him on the ground and started performing sternum rubs.
She said she then picked the child up and ran with him to JFRD rescue members on the scene.
“I remember saying, Narcan, Narcan, Narcan,” she said.
JFRD crews gave the child Narcan and then rushed him to Wolfson Children’s Hospital for treatment.
Thankfully, the child lived.
If you ask each of these first responders about the event, they will answer with modesty and tell you this is what they do every day.
On a more serious note, Moody said this is happening far too often.
“We know that in Jacksonville, in the last year full-year report from drugs identified in deceased persons report, the last full year report in Jacksonville almost 600 people died and I think two of those were children,” said Moody.
The Narcan used in the life-saving efforts by first responders was from the H.E.R.O.S (Helping Emergency Responders Obtain Support) program which gives first responders free access to Narcan.
“For the last few years we have not had to spend any city money on Narcan and I mean we are talking hundreds of thousands of dollars we are getting form the H.E.R.O.S program to stock every apparatus,” Blanton said.
This time, Narcan was used to save a life on a day that these first responders will never forget.
“This is absolutely why I get into it,” Langston said.