When her daughter, Crystal, had surgery, Joanna Franklin rarely left her side.
The doctor who helped Crystal was the same trusted doctor who delivered her, and he made the difficult decision to put Crystal on addictive painkillers to help her recovery. Due to HIPPA laws, Franklin wasn’t informed.
As time went by, Franklin noticed Crystal pulling away from the family. Later, she discovered why.
Crystal struggled with substance use disorder (SUD), and she thought she had to struggle alone.
“We were very close … but she didn’t want the shame she was feeling to fall on us, when what we were trying to do was help her,” Franklin said. “Come to find out, (the surgery) is when she became addicted … and she didn’t tell us because people don’t tell,” Franklin said.
Describing her as a sweet, intelligent and beautiful soul and even more beautiful woman, Joanna recalled how Crystal made peace and reconnected with God before she died due to an overdose, leaving behind six children.
Now, Franklin is working to combat SUD through sharing her daughter’s story.
“Although it’s still painful, it’s a way to help,” Franklin said. “What if I stayed back and hid and something fell on (her children) because awareness was not what it should be? Because legislative problems and roadblocks are never changed, because no one addressed it?”
Overdose death trends point to a problem
In her effort to make change, Franklin and her organization, Crooked Creek Alert, joined a local nonprofit committed to helping those affected by addiction.
An early partnership with Indiana University professor Dr. Dong-Chul Seo played a key role.
Alarmed by a seven-fold increase in fentanyl-related overdoses from 2016 to 2021, he sought further data. Seo discovered that, while the proportion of white fatal overdose deaths decreased over that period, rates increased for the Black population.
Seo saw similar trends in 2022, when the nationwide overdose death rate was 32.6 per 100,000 people. But in Indiana, the number was 41, and in Marion County, it was 82.
Then, when Seo looked at the overdose death rates of Black residents in four Indianapolis zip codes, that number rose to 198.
“It’s unacceptably high,” Seo said.
Armed with that data, Seo applied for a federal grant in 2022 from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health.
With funding from the grant, Seo helped start the SOUL Coalition in October of that year with Justin Phillips, founder and CEO of Overdose Lifeline (ODL), and Charlotte Crabtree, ODL’s Diversity and Outreach Program Manager. This same coalition is the one that Franklin’s organization also partners with.
By 2023, the overdose death rate in the targeted zip codes deceased from 198 to 144. Seo hopes SOUL’s work contributed to the decrease but noted it could be an overall trend.
SOUL — which stands for support, overcome, understand and live — seeks to lower overdose rates in the Black community through dismantling barriers.
This project builds upon work done under the previous name, MACRO-B (Multi-Level Community-Driven Approaches to Remove Structural Racism and Overdose Deaths in Black Indianapolis Communities).
Treatment disparity puts Black community at risk
Both Seo’s research and the rebranded SOUL project aligned with work Crabtree had been doing with her team.
In 2020, as rates of overdoses from opioids such as fentanyl began to rise, ODL distributed 40,000 kits of naloxone, a medication that reverses the effects of opioid overdose.
Out of these 40,000 kits, only a single dose went to a Black person.
As access to naloxone dwindled, overdose rates continued to increase the most amongst the Black population.
Crabtree sought a solution.
The ODL team used figures from the Marion County Coroner’s Office to identify the zip codes that weren’t receiving kits — 46202, 46205, 46208 and 46218.
All these zip codes were predominantly Black, Crabtree said, and they accounted for 70 to 75% of overdose deaths.
“Community in Crisis” shares resources and awareness
Bringing together organizations like Franklin’s Crooked Creek Alert, churches, treatment centers and more, Crabtree helped create the SOUL coalition.
Now, the coalition includes officers from the Indianapolis Fire Department, local EMT and EMS officers, I.U. Public Health staff, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, the Marion County’s Coroner Office and PACE Indy.
With these partners, Crabtree and ODL host SOUL committee meetings public town halls titled “Community in Crisis.”
On June 8, the first town hall was held at Martin University, a location within one of the targeted zip codes. At the meeting, naloxone and other resources were available from local treatment centers.
Shron Rucker, a community activist and coalition member, voiced how the identified zip codes contained a food desert with many liquor stores, gas stations and vacant buildings.
These same areas had little to no recovery centers, grocery stores, libraries and banks, which Rucker said can contribute to drug use and crime rates.
At the meeting, the coalition expressed how awareness and resources could help.
“This is a community problem, and it’s shown up on our doorstep, so let’s work together,” Crabtree said.
Read part 2 of this story on indianapolisrecorder.com.
Contact Indianapolis Recorder intern, Kayla Barlow, at kaylab@indyrecorder.com
