"If it saves one life, it's worth it": Dundee police trained to use Naloxone
The drug reverses the effects of opioids like heroin - which can pull people out of an overdose.
Last updated 3rd May 2021
Every single officer in Dundee is being urged to back a pilot project which would give them the skills to reverse heroin overdoses.
Officers are being trained in delivering Naloxone.
The emergency medication has already been used to save someone's life.
"A person who there was a concern call for, and officers arrived where they issued Naloxone, which resulted in the successful result in that person actually being okay. "
Training sessions for officers have been taking place over the last three weeks for officers across Tayside, and just under 90% say they would be willing to carry the drug.
Tay News spoke to Superintendent Nicola Russell:
"A person who there was a concern call for, and officers arrived where they issued Naloxone, which resulted in the successful result in that person actually being okay.
"We already have a number of officers are trained in it and have chosen to carry it, those numbers will change over the coming weeks when further people are trained.
"The reality is that if one person carries it and one person administers it, that's successful.
"We're not into week three of the training, we've had a number of officer carry it or choose to carry it."
We've also been hearing from a Dundee grandmother, who saved her daughter's life with Naloxone.
"That was the most frightening experience of my life, I'll never forget that."
Pauline Kinsman says it should be a no-brainer for police to carry the drug. She spoke to us about her experience using the drug to save her daughter.
"That was the most frightening experience of my life, I'll never forget that, " she said.
"When it comes to the end of the trial, I hope there're not going to stop and then look at the data and then start again, because there'll be lives lost in between.
"It needs to continue and needs to be more widely used, definitely, we're the drug death capital of Europe."