This Must Be the Place booth at a festival in May. Photo courtesy of This Must Be the Place.
A nonprofit is touring music and arts festivals like Lollapalooza this year to help stop opioid overdoses.
Driving the news: This Must Be the Place, which was started by couple William Perry and Ingela Travers-Hayward last year, will be giving out about 4,500 doses of an overdose-reversing nasal spray for free at Lolla Thursday through Sunday.
Why it matters: Cook County saw a record 2,000 opioid overdoses last year, surpassing 1,935 in 2021.
- 230 of those overdoses were among people ages 20-29, the predominant demographic expected at Lollapalooza.
How it works: Anyone who stops by This Must Be the Place's booth can get Kloxxado, a spray containing naloxone, as well as instructions on how to use it and how to spot a possible overdose.
What they're saying: Perry, a certified drug counselor who's in recovery for opioid addiction, and Travers-Hayward tell Axios they were called to action after seeing more casual drug users overdose, especially with the prevalence of fentanyl in various drugs.
- Travers-Hayward encourages everyone, even non-drug users, to pick up Kloxxado, as you might have to use it to help somebody around you.
- "We had this girl … she sent us a DM on Instagram later telling us that 24 hours after she took some from us, she administered it on someone in a park in downtown Seattle."
Be smart: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says signs of an overdose include:
- Small, constricted "pinpoint pupils"
- Falling asleep or loss of consciousness
- Choking or gurgling sounds
- Pale, blue, or cold skin
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