Ithaca College Harm Reduction Panel [AUDIO]

05/17/17: Ithaca College seniors organized a panel about the Ithaca Plan to reduce heroin use. They focused on how the plan’s harm reduction approach could save lives, including one of its recommendations to open a supervised injection site.

Key leaders in Ithaca talked at the panel, such as Former Tompkins County DA and Interim Drug Policy Coordinator Gwen Wilkinson. But the panel was a lot more than a dry policy debate. A paramedic, doctor, and recovering heroin addict, among others, shared personal struggles with fighting the heroin epidemic. And one of the panelists came out publicly for the first time as a sober person in recovery at the end of the panel. A hint? It’s not the former heroin addict.

WRFI’s Laura Rosbrow-Telem brings us this report.