Oneida County Response Team Issues Overdose Alert

The Oneida County Response Team is issuing a warning after a recent spike in overdoses.

The county says sixteen people have reportedly overdosed on drugs in Oneida County in the first twelve days of September.  Ten are believed to be from heroin.

Officials warn the increase may be due to tainted heroin, including heroin laced with fentanyl.

“Using ODMAP surveillance data to capture real-time reports of overdoses, the Overdose Response Team has developed a spike alert process, where when we see a certain number of overdoses in a certain time period, we know that there could be a public safety and health issue, so we mobilize to push out that information as quickly as possible,” said Oneida County Executive Anthony Picente.

Fentanyl test strips are available by calling ACR Heath at (315) 793-0661.

Officials are asking the public to watch out for signs of an overdose, including unresponsiveness and shallow breathing.