MN Bill Would Allow Cops to Give Heroin Antidote

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — A state senator whose daughter died of a heroin overdose wants all law enforcement officers in Minnesota to carry an antidote that could have potentially saved her child.

Currently in Minnesota it's illegal for anyone other than a health care professional to inject the antidote known as Narcan. The drug stops the effects of an overdose.

Sen. Chris Eaton's daughter, Ariel, was 23 years old when she died in 2007 in a Brooklyn Center parking lot. Eaton says the first responders were police, but it was 40 minutes before her daughter was given the antidote.

WCCO-TV reports 16 other states allow officers to carry and administer the antidote, which can be injected or given as a nasal spray. The senator says she will introduce the bill in the next legislative session, which begins in February.