BY DEBBIE PAGE
About 100 people gathered at Christ Church in Statesville on Thursday evening to remember family and friends lost to the epidemic of overdoses occurring here and all over the United States, with many falling victim to counterfeit drugs laced with deadly fentanyl.
The Drug-Alcohol Coalition of Iredell (DACI) sponsored the candlelight vigil and remembrance luminaries, in conjunction with Christ Church and its Celebrate Recovery program.
Provisional data from CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics estimates that 107,543 drug overdose deaths occurred nationally in 2023.
Opioids accounted for 81,083 overdoses last year, with 74,702 of those deaths as a result of synthetic opioids like fentanyl. Methamphetamine and other psychostimulants took an estimated 36,251lives, and cocaine overdose caused in 29,918 deaths.
In 2023, an average of nearly 12 people died each day in North Carolina from overdoses.
Preliminary state data from the N.C. Office of the Chief Medical Examiner shows that 4,156 people died from drug overdose last year.
During the remembrance ceremony, Stefanie Duck shared her heartbreaking loss of her 18-year-old son, Timothy “T.J.” Cothron, to fentanyl poisoning in February of 2022. T.J. was a 2021 graduate of South Iredell High School and participated in marching band and MJROTC.
A nurse, she said that T.J. was learning to be an adult, working a full-time job at the Walmart Distribution Center and planning to join the military and get engaged to his girlfriend Sarah in the coming year. However, T.J. began struggling with depression after his father’s serious illness.
He began using oxycodone to cope with his mental health challenges. T.J. was hospitalized after reaching out for help and put on antidepressants. Hanging out at his father’s house on February 17, T.J. and a friend took what they thought was oxycodone but was actually a fentanyl-laced counterfeit.
Her son Zack called her at 3:13 a.m. to stay T.J. had been found not breathing and medics were performing CPR, intubating and shocking T.J. as well. At 3:41 a.m. he was pronounced dead.
Though Duck told them that T.J. had admitted to using oxycodone, the first responders did not administer Narcan. Three months later, Duck learned T.J. had 18 nanograms of fentanyl in his system, enough to kill nine people.
Duck said T.J. gave great hugs, was generous and kind, and loved life. She is devastated that T.J. is no longer here to brighten their lives.
However, she is turning her pain into purpose by sharing T.J.’s story. She has started a nonprofit, T.J.’s Story Lives On”, and is the western chapter director for Forgotten Victims of North Carolina and is active with Fentanyl Victims of North Carolina (http://fentvic.org).
Duck asked the Iredell-Statesville Schools Board of Education on August 12 to put Naloxone, a nasal spray drug that reverses an opioid overdose, in every school. Her mission is to get it in every school office and train staff and SROs to use it.
She has requested that some of the state’s opioid settlement money be allocated to putting Narcan supplies in every school in the state.
DACI has offered to provide a policy for the school board to adopt, train staff to use Narcan, and provide some Narcan (naloxone) to the effort.
Duck also believes that dealers who sell fentanyl-laced drugs should be charged with murder because they are poisoning people.
Duck urged everyone to share testimonies of loss and overdose because the stories make a difference. Many people suffer traumas and make poor decisions to cope with their emotional pain, so anyone can be subject to this terrible poison flooding into the country.
Christ Church Recovery Pastor Brian King asked attendees to spread the word and carry hope, awareness, and light into the community through their testimonies about the dangers of fentanyl.
“The key to unlock the chain of substance use that someone is stuck in and to walk out of it and take one step at a time into recovery.”
Attendees then passed the flame from Pastor Chip McGee’s candle and lifted their candles up as a symbol of their commitment. They then filed out of the sanctuary to an outdoor area to view the remembrance luminaries and share words of comfort and hope with others.
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