“I was brought to a room at one point as a county employee, with major county and city staff, and basically told to shut up,” Amy Upham, who worked as opioid response coordinator for Buncombe County Department of Health and Human Services (BCDHHS) from 2019-21, told an audience at Pack Memorial Library last week.
“It’s not going to be fun to point out how historically some things haven’t worked out so great and they have bad impact on business and the residents,” Coalition of Asheville Neighborhoods president Rick Freeman told the audience at the Coalition of Independent Business Owners meeting April 5.
In 2016, Maia Hughes decided to begin recovery after 13 years of substance abuse. But it wasn’t only substance use disorder she needed to address. She had also tested positive for hepatitis C, a virus that spreads through blood.
“Lots of people in our region and state could be cured so easily if we take the steps to make this happen locally and show them the way.”
“Syringe service programs are the primary drivers behind the reduction of overdose and hepatitis C-related deaths.”
“Younger members of our communities are vulnerable when not provided enough knowledge to avoid getting this easily preventable viral infection and not to become a continuous cycle of new generations with HIV in decades to come.”
