By John Daley, Colorado Public Radio
Coloradans will continue to have access statewide to a key medication that reverses overdoses — thanks to a $3 million grant.
Attorney General Phil Weiser announced Tuesday that money from Colorado’s opioid settlement haul will go into a statewide fund to buy naloxone, also called Narcan, in bulk.
This story was produced as part of the Colorado Capitol News Alliance. It first appeared at cpr.org.
“It works. It really works,” said Rica Rodriguez, the founder and executive director of Promotores de Esperanza, a community group that distributes the kits.
Speaking at the announcement made at Denver Health, she said it saved her from overdose three times.
“Naloxone saves lives, but access must be equitable,” she said. “Culturally competent harm reduction is not a luxury, but a necessity…Today I stand before you alive because someone believed I was worth saving.”
Michael Miller, opioid initiative coordinator with Jefferson County Public Health, also spoke of the benefits of the medication. He too is a three-time overdose survivor thanks to naloxone.
“Public and vocal support for this fund has already saved lives. It saved my life,” Miller said. “People like me shouldn’t be sentenced to a coffin or to permanent disability. Seconds matter.”
Naloxone saves lives by reversing an overdose from opioids when given in time, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That includes heroin, fentanyl, and prescription opioid medication.
One of its primary benefits is that naloxone is easy to use and small to carry. It comes in two types usable even without medical training or special authorization: prefilled nasal spray and injectable.
The funds come at a critical moment, Weiser told a crowd at Denver Health’s Center for Addiction Medicine in downtown Denver.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, a Democrat, speaks at a news conference on Tuesday, June 24, 2025, in Denver, Colorado, where he announced a $3 million grant to fight opioid overdoses. (Jesse Paul, The Colorado Sun)Colorado is facing the loss of federal public health funding because of cuts announced by the Trump administration and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Nationally, the Trump administration chopped a massive sum, $11 billion, that was slated to go to states. Colorado was set to receive nearly $230 million of that.
Weiser and attorneys general from other states sued, winning a preliminary reprieve, but he said with Colorado potentially losing the funding, all bets are off for funding many public health priorities.
“That’s now gone,” said Weiser, a Democrat now running for governor. “It is so wrong that the federal government isn’t continuing to support, across America, naloxone as one of the most, if not the best proven strategies to fight this epidemic and save lives.”
The state’s Naloxone Bulk Purchase Fund was previously supported by one-time federal money, he said. The program supplies it to all 64 counties, at no cost to schools, harm reduction groups, law enforcement and other groups.
But he said a settlement just last week with pharmaceutical giant Purdue Pharma and its owners the Sackler family, will bring $7.5 billion to states.
Including this new settlement, Colorado has obtained agreements committing nearly $870 million from companies that fueled the nation’s opioid epidemic, according to a news release from the Attorney General’s Office.
The Purdue settlement in principle is “the nation’s largest settlement to date with individuals responsible for the opioid crisis.” the release said. Colorado will receive an estimated $75,670,000 from it over the next 15 years.
Naloxone kits on a table at a news event at Denver Health’s Center for Addiction Medicine in downtown Denver. (John Daley, CPR News via the Colorado Capitol News Alliance)Weiser said with the administration cutting back on funding research into health disparities, which hit African-American, Hispanic, American Indian and other diverse populations harder, it was important naloxone be fairly distributed.
“I want to acknowledge and lift up that Black and Hispanic communities haven’t seen the exact same level of reduction we’re talking about today, underscoring the work that we have to do and its connection to addressing inequities,” Weiser said.
The attorney general and other speakers stood in front of a chart showing annual fentanyl deaths in Colorado, rising to above a thousand in 2023, then falling well below that last year. Deaths fell nationwide last year.
More than 1,600 people died from overdoses of all kinds last year in Colorado. But public health officials say wide distribution of naloxone is preventing the number from being much higher.
“While that’s still far too many people, it is encouraging to see that deaths from overdoses decreased 14 percent compared to the previous year,” said Donna Lynne, Denver Health’s CEO.
The $3 million from the AG’s office won’t meet the full statewide need for naloxone but it ensures that high priority groups are funded through 2026, according to a spokesman.
Brooke Bender, administrative director with Denver Health’s Center for Addiction Medicine, said the hospital offers naloxone across its entire system. And it recently opened a new vending machine, called VENDY.
“We aim to de-stigmatize addiction treatment and harm reduction tools to make them accessible and to keep people alive and help them thrive,” Bender said.
“It’s a nightmare. Everybody in our community is on edge.”
Rodiguez, with Promotores de Esperanza, said the funding comes just in time. Her group had seen a $115,000 cut to funding from the city of Denver specifically for Narcan distribution. “So we won’t be able to pay our contractors, to be able to do the work,” she said.
With that grant, her group distributed 5,900 doses of naloxone last year.
“But thankfully with the bulk fund supply, we will still have access to the Narcan and we will make it happen and we’ll find funding to make it happen,” she said.
Rica Rodriguez is the founder and executive director of Promotores de Esperanza, a community group that distributes kits of naloxone, which also goes by the name Narcan. (John Daley, CPR News via the Colorado Capitol News Alliance)The sudden loss of a lot of federal funds is hitting the community hard, she said.
“It’s a nightmare. Everybody in our community is on edge. Everybody is wondering what’s going to happen when I don’t have access to Narcan and my son overdoses or my grandson overdoses, or even my grandmother,” Rodriguez said.
She said knew a grandmother who overdosed because she forgot that she took her pain medicine, then took another one and overdosed, not realizing that she forgot.
“Thankfully, her grandson had been there and had Narcan on board and saved her life,” Rodriguez said. “So everybody’s just in total chaos right now. Just wondering what’s going to happen, especially with Medicaid funding and all the other cuts that are happening.”
Rodriguez said she’s been sober for 19 years, after using heroin and opioids. Three times she overdosed on prescription pills but had the overdose reversed, thanks to naloxone, which was only available on the black market then.
“It is definitely an enabler of breathing. That’s all it enables,” she said. “People like to say that it enables drug usage, but it absolutely does not. It just keeps people alive so that we can find a pathway to recovery. And if we’re not breathing, then we can’t find recovery.”
This story was produced by the Capitol News Alliance, a collaboration between KUNC News, Colorado Public Radio, Rocky Mountain PBS and The Colorado Sun, and shared with Rocky Mountain Community Radio and other news organizations across the state. Funding for the Alliance is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
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