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Remote Area Medical coming to Ashtabula Co. for free clinic

Remote Area Medical coming to Ashtabula Co. for free clinic

Yahoo28-02-2025

(WJET/WFXP)– Another free healthcare clinic is on its way to the region, this time taking place in Ashtabula County near the end of March.
Remote Area Medical (RAM) announced this week they're hosting a healthcare clinic for residents, regardless of their insurance standing, free of charge offering dental, vision and medical care to anyone in need.
Morgan Freeman coming to Chautauqua Institute this summer
RAM will be at Lakeside Junior High School, located at 6620 Sanborn Road, on March 22 and 23 with doors opening at 6 a.m. each day and patients being seen on a first come, first served basis.
No ID or insurance is required for the event with general medical exams, dental cleanings, extractions, eye exams, and prescription glasses made on-site available throughout the weekend.
There will also be free Narcan training take-home HTV kits, local healthcare options, nutrition, and more.
Jersey Mike's Subs Month of Giving returning this March
RAM is encouraging anyone who may need or want the free services to attend and to show up as early as possible, especially if they're looking for dental services.
Attendees should also be prepared to choose between dental and vision services due to time constraints. The ending time also may vary based on how much each service can be provided.
For more information on the event, check out their Facebook page.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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McKee signs four pairs of bills into law
McKee signs four pairs of bills into law

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McKee signs four pairs of bills into law

Automatic external defibrillators will now be required on golf courses as a result of a new law named for a Johnston golfer who died after having a heart attack on the 18th hole at the Cranston Country Club in 2023. (Getty image) Four new laws signed on June 6 by Gov. Dan McKee aim to improve emergency care for heart attacks on golf courses, train lifeguards and park rangers to administer Narcan, extend the trial period for the state's safe injection site in Providence, and formalize the waiting period before adults with drivers permits can take their road test. Here's a look at the legislation behind the four new laws: 1. Automatic external defibrillators will now be required on golf courses as a result of the David Casey Act. Its namesake is a Johnston golfer who died after having a heart attack on the 18th hole at the Cranston Country Club. Casey was 58 years old. Companion bills, sponsored by Rep. Deborah Fellela and Sen. Andrew Dimitiri, both Johnston Democrats, amended the state's rules on locations where defibrillators are mandatory. State law had required defibrillators in enclosed spaces capable of holding 300 or more people. Spaces include bars, self-service laundry, shopping malls, arenas, government offices, and waiting rooms. 'David's death was tragic, and has mobilized his widow, Betsy, to become an advocate for AEDs on all golf courses,' Felella said in a statement issued by the State House Tuesday. 'She wants to make sure that David's death makes a difference, and if we save even one life, we reach that goal.' Rhode Island Department of Health Director Jerome 'Jerry' Larkin voiced support for the legislation in a Feb. 6 letter to the House Committee on Health and Human Services. He stated that using defibrillators and performing CPR within minutes of cardiac arrest can significantly boost survival rates. 2. The nation's first state-regulated safe injection site will continue for another two years. Project Weber/RENEW, the nonprofit that operates the South Providence site at 45 Willard Ave., was supposed to end its pilot overdose prevention program in 2026. Legislation sponsored by Rep. Jay Edwards, a Tiverton Democrat, extends the program through 2028. The law also mandates new reporting requirements on the number of people connected to other specialists for addiction treatment, and total overdoses prevented. McKee, Providence Mayor Brett Smiley and the Mental Health Association of Rhode Island each wrote to lawmakers to back the extension bill. 'Even one more life lost to substance use disorder and the opioid epidemic is one too many and HRCs are a critical preventative resource,' McKee wrote to the committee in February. Companion legislation was sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Melissa Murray, a Woonsocket Democrat. 3. Rhode Island's lifeguards and park rangers will now be required to be trained in administering opioid reversal drugs such as Narcan. This mandate comes from companion bills sponsored by Rep. William O'Brien, a North Providence Democrat, and Senate Majority Whip David Tikoian, a Smithfield Democrat. The bill also requires public beaches and parks to have at least four doses of this medicine available at all times. 'The sad reality we find ourselves in today is that opioid overdoses can happen anytime and anywhere,' O'Brien said in a statement. 'While we continue to combat the opioid crisis, this bill will save many lives.' The legislation originated from North Providence High School student Brennan O'Connor's senior project, according to a State House news release. 4. Rhode Island residents age 18 or older will have to wait at least 30 days after receiving a learner's permit before taking the road test. The law signed by McKee stems from matching bills sponsored by Democrats Rep. Robert Phillips of Woonsocket and Sen. Lou DiPalma of Middletown. It requires adults to wait at least 30 days after receiving a learner's permit before taking the road test for a full license. Rhode Island's Division of Motor Vehicles already mandates a 30-day waiting period, agency spokesperson Paul Grimaldi said via email Tuesday. It just was never codified under state law. 'A way to make certain things clear and succinct — you put it into Rhode Island General Law' DiPalma said in an interview. Under the new law, adult drivers' permits would expire one year after being issued. Permits can be renewed, but just once. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX

Music festivals have become more open to harm reduction initiatives. How far will it go?

time19 hours ago

Music festivals have become more open to harm reduction initiatives. How far will it go?

NEW YORK -- The sounds of muffled percussion and audience cheers reverberate throughout the grounds. Brand activations, makeshift bars and restaurant pop-ups control traffic as a sea of bodies move from set to set. Sandwiched between is a row of nonprofits across familiar causes: hunger, housing and voter registration. It's a common music festival scene, until closer inspection. There is a new table, This Must Be the Place. The Ohio-based nonprofit offers attendees free opioid overdose reversal treatment and training on how to use it, an education acquired in under two minutes. Just a few years ago, their inclusion might've been unthinkable amid murky regulations and a lack of public awareness surrounding harm reduction. Advocates say drugs are commonly consumed at music festivals, making them ideal locations for harm reduction activities. While more music festivals are allowing such activities, activists are pushing for expanded efforts as some festivals remain cautious. 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According to Daliah Heller, vice president of overdose prevention initiatives at the global public health nonprofit Vital Strategies, naloxone distribution used to be determined by state regulations until 2023, when the Food and Drug Administration approved the first over-the-counter nasal spray. 'We no longer need the prescription laws to be amended to allow for the distribution of naloxone,' she says. 'Now it's like buying aspirin — it's over the counter.' Last year, This Must Be the Place gave away 46,146 units of Narcan — a brand name for naloxone — through their national festival outreach. Emmett Beliveau, chief operating officer of C3 Presents, says working with This Must Be the Place was C3's first time implementing public-facing harm reduction strategies, in addition to the promoter's existing medical programs. Bringing the organization into C3's festivals was 'not in response to anything that has happened at one of our festivals,' he says, but rather because of the 'number of fatalities happening in our communities.' Some activists believe attendees are most responsive to receiving harm reduction education from peers instead of authority figures. And so, for the last three years, a nonprofit dedicated to combating accidental drug overdoses among young adults, Team Awareness Combating Overdose, has distributed fentanyl test strips and Narcan at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. Former TACO CEO Kameran Mody says that music festivals are ideal locations for distribution and education because 'music and the use of drugs are synonymous with each other.' TACO distributes through what Mody describes as 'guerrilla-style marketing.' They enlist volunteers, train them on how to use naloxone, and ship Narcan and test strips to them to bring into the festival. They do not involve the festival organizers. Representatives for Coachella did not respond to The Associated Press' requests for comment. In 2023, a TACO volunteer administered Narcan to an unresponsive Coachella attendee exhibiting signs of an overdose. The organization says the attendee regained consciousness. 'That was one of our biggest successes,' Mody says. In 2019, at Bonnaroo, a 27-year-old man was found dead at his campsite — right after harm reduction activists had picketed the Tennessee festival because it didn't allow drug testing. The toxicology report found ecstasy and fentanyl in his system. At the time, under state law, test strips were criminalized and classified as drug paraphernalia. That's changed: In 2022, Tennessee decriminalized fentanyl test strips. By the end of 2023, 44 other states and D.C. had done the same. 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Perry says they are aware of smaller festivals in the United States conducting drug checking, but 'they do it in a very underground and whisper network way' to avoid criminalization. What Perry says his organization would like to see at music festivals in the future would be harm reduction areas — sections where attendees who have taken drugs can be monitored, not to 'get them into trouble' but to ensure safety. Heller says there are a number of groups working to destigmatize drugs, promote decriminalization, and promote drug checking. 'We already have drug checking happening in cities,' she says. 'It makes perfect sense to expand the settings where you would offer that to include music festivals. It's the same rationale. ... The issue is this idea of liability. You'd have to create a law, essentially, that would protect the festival from liability.'

Music festivals have become more open to harm reduction initiatives. How far will it go?
Music festivals have become more open to harm reduction initiatives. How far will it go?

San Francisco Chronicle​

time19 hours ago

  • San Francisco Chronicle​

Music festivals have become more open to harm reduction initiatives. How far will it go?

NEW YORK (AP) — The sounds of muffled percussion and audience cheers reverberate throughout the grounds. Brand activations, makeshift bars and restaurant pop-ups control traffic as a sea of bodies move from set to set. Sandwiched between is a row of nonprofits across familiar causes: hunger, housing and voter registration. It's a common music festival scene, until closer inspection. There is a new table, This Must Be the Place. The Ohio-based nonprofit offers attendees free opioid overdose reversal treatment and training on how to use it, an education acquired in under two minutes. Just a few years ago, their inclusion might've been unthinkable amid murky regulations and a lack of public awareness surrounding harm reduction. Advocates say drugs are commonly consumed at music festivals, making them ideal locations for harm reduction activities. While more music festivals are allowing such activities, activists are pushing for expanded efforts as some festivals remain cautious. Harm reduction varies at festivals across the country Founded by William Perry and Ingela Travers-Hayward in 2022, This Must Be The Place has since given away an estimated $4.5 million in naloxone, the opioid overdose reversal medication, at festivals and smaller community events. In the very beginning, without a 'proof of concept,' as Perry describes it, they had trouble partnering with festivals. Eventually, a few festivals in the Midwest agreed to let them table, which 'got us in the door with Bonnaroo in 2022,' says Perry, referring to the major U.S. festival operated by C3 Presents, one of the largest concert promoters on the planet. Now they have a presence at 35 major U.S. festivals — including Lollapalooza, Governors Ball and Besame Mucho — where they collaborate directly with C3 and their security personnel. The organization's growth overlaps with advancing federal regulations. According to Daliah Heller, vice president of overdose prevention initiatives at the global public health nonprofit Vital Strategies, naloxone distribution used to be determined by state regulations until 2023, when the Food and Drug Administration approved the first over-the-counter nasal spray. 'We no longer need the prescription laws to be amended to allow for the distribution of naloxone,' she says. 'Now it's like buying aspirin — it's over the counter.' Last year, This Must Be the Place gave away 46,146 units of Narcan — a brand name for naloxone — through their national festival outreach. Emmett Beliveau, chief operating officer of C3 Presents, says working with This Must Be the Place was C3's first time implementing public-facing harm reduction strategies, in addition to the promoter's existing medical programs. Bringing the organization into C3's festivals was 'not in response to anything that has happened at one of our festivals,' he says, but rather because of the 'number of fatalities happening in our communities.' Some attendees have taken matters into their own hands Some activists believe attendees are most responsive to receiving harm reduction education from peers instead of authority figures. And so, for the last three years, a nonprofit dedicated to combating accidental drug overdoses among young adults, Team Awareness Combating Overdose, has distributed fentanyl test strips and Narcan at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. Former TACO CEO Kameran Mody says that music festivals are ideal locations for distribution and education because 'music and the use of drugs are synonymous with each other.' TACO distributes through what Mody describes as 'guerrilla-style marketing.' They enlist volunteers, train them on how to use naloxone, and ship Narcan and test strips to them to bring into the festival. They do not involve the festival organizers. Representatives for Coachella did not respond to The Associated Press' requests for comment. In 2023, a TACO volunteer administered Narcan to an unresponsive Coachella attendee exhibiting signs of an overdose. The organization says the attendee regained consciousness. 'That was one of our biggest successes,' Mody says. Local laws and the risk of criminalization hinder initiatives In 2019, at Bonnaroo, a 27-year-old man was found dead at his campsite — right after harm reduction activists had picketed the Tennessee festival because it didn't allow drug testing. The toxicology report found ecstasy and fentanyl in his system. At the time, under state law, test strips were criminalized and classified as drug paraphernalia. That's changed: In 2022, Tennessee decriminalized fentanyl test strips. By the end of 2023, 44 other states and D.C. had done the same. But in some states, drug paraphernalia laws are written in a way that isn't completely transparent — there are test strips that are not fentanyl-specific, Heller points out — and criminalization and social stigmas endure. Some have found workarounds. 'Even in the states where the legalities were a bit unclear, instead of just coming in and hoping things worked out, we would reach out to the health department, and say 'We run this project, how do feel about it?'' says Perry. 'We would end up with letters from the highest-ranking health official, either in the county or in the state, saying 'We approve of this.' That circumvented any roadblocks.' Some festivals, though, might be hesitant to use test strips because 'it's tough for them to admit that drugs are being used,' Mody says. Some festivals have even banned naloxone. While This Must Be The Place distributes fentanyl test strips at some Ohio events, C3 doesn't distribute test strips at its events and does not plan to. Beliveau doesn't believe fentanyl test strips are effective and expressed concern they could encourage drug use. Test strips, which can detect fentanyl in pills, powders or injectables, are recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a low-cost means of helping prevent drug overdoses. Harm reduction shows promise outside the US At a three-day electronic music festival in Mexico City earlier this year, a booth provided free, anonymous drug testing. The initiative, known as 'Checa tu Sustancia' (Check Your Substance), was spearheaded by the Instituto RIA, a Mexico-based drug policy research and advocacy organization. When unexpected substances are detected, users received detailed information on what they are, their risks, potential interactions with other substances and dosage adjustments, empowering them to make informed choices. Perry says they are aware of smaller festivals in the United States conducting drug checking, but 'they do it in a very underground and whisper network way' to avoid criminalization. What Perry says his organization would like to see at music festivals in the future would be harm reduction areas — sections where attendees who have taken drugs can be monitored, not to 'get them into trouble' but to ensure safety. Heller says there are a number of groups working to destigmatize drugs, promote decriminalization, and promote drug checking. 'We already have drug checking happening in cities,' she says. 'It makes perfect sense to expand the settings where you would offer that to include music festivals. It's the same rationale. ... The issue is this idea of liability. You'd have to create a law, essentially, that would protect the festival from liability.'

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