Research Goals: This longitudinal ethnographic study examines the impacts of the structural context for overdose prevention (local, state, and national policies and protocols) on the community-based response to overdose in Washington, D.C. Since 2016, I have been engaged in ethnographic research at a community-based field site with a cohort of people who use drugs (n=40) and cohort of institutional stakeholders (n=15).
The study is innovative in approach because it uses ethnographic methods to consider the relationship between policy, traditional modes of overdose surveillance, and community-based responses by people at the front lines of the overdose epidemic. The study is significant because according to the CDC, in 2016, the District of Columbia was ranked 4th in the nation for the highest overdose rate at 38.8 per 100,000. In addition, the demographics of the overdose epidemic in the District of Columbia are particularly unique. Racial demographics and the geography of overdose death map onto each other to reflect that those most impacted by overdose death in Washington, D.C. are African-American men between the ages of 40-69 who live in Wards 7 and 8, which are predominantly African-American areas of the city [18]. My ethnographic cohort of people who use drugs reflects this demographic group and thus will provide critical data on disparities related to overdose death and access to naloxone, along with how the criminalization of African-American people who use drugs takes place even in the context of protective policy, such as Good Samaritan Laws.
Data from this study will be published in the forthcoming book: States of Emergency: Death, Deservingness, and the U.S. Overdose Crisis
Read a piece from this dataset: "Resisting Overdose" here.
