Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that has flooded the United States and driven a surge in deadly drug overdoses. It’s also ballooned the demand for treatment and recovery services.
Roanoke marked National Fentanyl Awareness Day Tuesday by dedicating a new recovery house.
Before organizers and First Lady Suzanne Youngkin cut the ribbon on the Four Truths Recovery house on Staunton Avenue they laid out the troubling facts—Roanoke has one of the highest fatal overdose rates in the state, according to the Virginia Department of Health. And a recent study found the region needs more than 900 recovery program beds.
"There’s so much more to recovery than just abstinence from drugs," Four Truths Recovery co-founder Christine Wright noted. "And this model is really around that whole person wheel.""
Wright says this program will serve up to eight men at a time, providing housing, access to job and transportation resources, and peer counseling.
Wright is now eight years into her own recovery. She took the first step while she was in jail and said she was blessed to have a supportive place to take the next step, an option many others don’t have.
"If they have no place to go that is safe and supportive afterwards, they go back to the unhealthy environments that are toxic for them in their recovery. And then they start the cycle all over again."
The non-profit program will begin taking in residents this month. Wright hopes it can add other locations to serve women and families.
The demand for recovery program housing is a statewide need, Virginia Secretary of Health and Human Resources John Littel said.
"We believe recovery works," Littel emphasized. "And it needs to be in a place where people can be supported and be around people who have been through this process."
First Lady Suzanne Youngkin, who joined Littel and Wright for the event, said recovery housing is tougher to find for families. "The state is strained to try to figure out how to deal with that," Youngkin said. "We are not equipped to come alongside young people and move them out their homes and into loving and safe homes where they can seek renewal and recovery.
Youngkin has made awareness about the dangers of fentanyl a focus of her time as First Lady. She has been crisscrossing the state publicizing the "It only takes one" campaign.
