Efforts to educate about spice continue here on the Kenai as Anchorage’s Mayor Ethan Berkowitz plans to introduce a resolution to increase fines and charges for spice related crimes in Anchorage tonight.
Kenai Peninsula anti-spice activist Jessica Burch gave a presentation to about 25 EMT students Tuesday, using her personal story of addiction to the designer drug as a way to share the dangers.
Burch: “To be able to help with our future first responders is a major privilege for me to be able to do this because it is exactly the goal I’m trying to do. It’s opening more doors for me, I’ll be talking at high schools pretty soon.”
Students in the Kenai Peninsula College class and Mat-Su class, which was linked in via video conferencing, were able to ask Burch questions about her experiences, such as what her withdrawal was like.
Burch: “I went through a month worth of withdrawal, my face felt numb to the touch and I had no taste buds, things like that that I couldn’t control, and I was scared.”
She says as she continues her education to become a drug counselor through KPC she is always looking for new venues to share her story and hopefully assist others experiencing the addiction.
Burch: “I’ve got contact with a counselor at SoHi and he needs me to write a proposal. I also just spoke with one of the students with the EMT program and he’s doing something at a Nikiski school and he wants to do something with myself as a team to go talk with them.”
In Alaska’s largest city, spice has been believed to have contributed in a huge spike of emergency calls and violent incidents, spurring Mayor Berkowitz’s resolution.
Burch says it can happen anywhere and although the Kenai has not seen the public displays like in Anchorage, there is already a problem here.
