skip to main content
skip to newscasts

Monday, March 31, 2025

Public News Service Logo
facebook instagram linkedin reddit youtube twitter
view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Wisconsin AG seeks to stop Elon Musk's $1M payments at rally giveaway; Rural advocates urge CA lawmakers to safeguard banking protections; Federal, state job cuts threaten FL workers' rights, services; Alabama counties lack high-speed internet and health access.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

President Trump says there are ways for him to take a third term. New tariffs are scheduled for this week, but economists say they'll hurt buying power. And advocates say the Trans Day of Visibility is made more important by state legislation.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Rural folks face significant clean air and water risks due to EPA cutbacks, a group of policymakers is working to expand rural health care via mobile clinics, and a new study maps Montana's news landscape.

Newly legal fentanyl testing strips help fight overdose deaths in MO

play audio
Play

Monday, November 13, 2023   

The rise in deaths involving synthetic opioids or fentanyl have overdose-prevention advocates looking for solutions across the nation.

Gov. Mike Parson recently signed a bill legalizing fentanyl test strips with hopes of lessening the death toll.

Rithvik Kondai Sr., overdose prevention coordinator for the Missouri Institute of Health, said these days it is hard to understand the trends, and fentanyl seems to be in everything.

"You think you're buying heroin but you're getting fentanyl," Kondai explained. "Now it's shifted to finding traces of it in cocaine, in meth, in MDMA, in other substances that are not opioids."

Missouri joins at least 20 other states in decriminalizing the drug-detection tool. Neighboring Kansas legalized fentanyl test strips earlier this year as well.

Kondai contended there is still more to do in the fight for overdose prevention and the government should not just stop at fentanyl test strips.

"There's now this adulterant called xylazine in the opioid supply," Kondai noted. "There are xylazine test strips available, but technically in Missouri, we wouldn't be allowed to give them out per se. Why not just take it to that next step where we can just make drug checking legal?"

Over the summer, the Biden administration announced a plan to combat the growing problem of fentanyl being laced with xylazine, an animal tranquilizer known by the slang term "tranq."

According to a report released last year by the Drug Enforcement Administration, xylazine-positive overdose deaths increased by more than 500% in the Midwest between 2020 and 2021.


get more stories like this via email

more stories
Mississippi's three-year recidivism rate reached 40% in 2023, according to state task force data - among the highest in the United States. (Pixabay)

Social Issues

play sound

For thousands of Mississippians leaving prison each year, a single question looms large: Who will hire me? State lawmakers could remove some of the …


Social Issues

play sound

This has been "National March Into Literacy Month" but it may become tougher over the summer to "march" into a public library and ask for help finding…

Environment

play sound

Groups in Pennsylvania are asking Congress to preserve federal clean-energy tax incentives. Concerned about the possible repeal of 30% energy tax …


Biosolids, also known as sewage sludge, were applied to farms in Johnson County as fertilizer to boost crop fertility. (zimmytws/Adobe Stock)

play sound

By Sara Hashemi for Sentient.Broadcast version by Freda Ross for Texas News Service reporting for the Sentient-Public News Service Collaboration John…

Environment

play sound

West Virginians are more concerned about bird flu's effect on grocery costs rather than health implications, and Republican voters are more likely to …

According to 2024 DEA laboratory testing, five of 10 pills tested contain a potentially deadly dose of fentanyl. (Adobe Stock)

Social Issues

play sound

The federal HALT Fentanyl Act advancing through Congress would increase prison time for fentanyl traffickers. Kentuckians convicted on distribution …

Social Issues

play sound

Labor groups representing thousands of Minnesota state workers find themselves at serious odds with Gov. Tim Walz over his move this week to reduce …

Social Issues

play sound

Minnesota lawmakers this session are emphasizing new protocols to shield state agencies from fraud. A watchdog group says so far, it appears they're …

 

Phone: 303.448.9105 Toll Free: 888.891.9416 Fax: 208.247.1830 Your trusted member- and audience-supported news source since 1996 Copyright © 2021