The Dare County Department of Health & Human Services, in partnership with the Saving Lives Task Force, will be awarded a $93,193 grant from North Carolina Department of Health & Human Services’ Injury and Violence Prevention Branch.

Dare County was one of twenty-two local health departments in North Carolina to receive this funding to implement community-level strategies to address the opioid crisis. The project aims to prevent fatal and non-fatal opioid overdoses, increase access and linkages to care services and build local capacity to respond to the opioid epidemic. The funding will be used to expand the current syringe exchange program, HighLife 252, and the Saving Lives Response Team.

HighLife 252, implemented by Source Church, currently operates on a limited budget, depending heavily on volunteers and community agencies to donate time and resources. The grant awarded will allow for program coordinators to receive continuing education, supplies and reimbursement for mileage on their personal vehicles.

The Saving Lives Response Team is currently piloting an overdose response project in Kill Devil Hills.  Planning for this initiative began this summer and the grant award is going to allow the response team to expand the pilot project to the entire Dare County area. The Saving Lives Response Team will benefit from this funding, as it will provide education, training, technological support and increase access to additional services for the outreach worker, law enforcement and recovery community partners.

For more information on this grant initiative, contact The Dare County Department of Health & Human Services health education and community outreach director and Saving Lives Task Force co-chair Roxana Ballinger at 252-475-5619 or roxana.ballinger@darenc.com.

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