Whitman Fire Lt. Tim Grenno knew how to save the 18-year-old man overdosing on the floor of the bathroom.
 The paramedic sprayed a mist of 2 milligrams of anti-narcotic Narcan up the teen's nose.
 The teen woke up and walked to the ambulance.
 It is harder to find a single way to stop someone from trying heroin - or get those who are addicted to stop.
 "You need to involve every group in a community. You have to have law enforcement, school officials, coaches, you have to have parents, churches, you have to begin to look at it as a systematic approach," said Michael Botticelli, the state's assistant commissioner of Substance Abuse Services.
 There are a things people can do to help:
 - Make sure schools have programs that teach children not to smoke, drink or use drugs and that there are consequences for every action.
 - Talk to children about drugs, about life, about peer pressure, Page 1

about their future.
 - Volunteer to coach or help start after school and summer youth programs.
 - Welcome halfway houses into the community.
 - Ask the schools to have a school resource officer in the schools.
 - Throw out prescribed OxyContin or other narcotic pain relievers once the drug isn't medically needed. Lock up any drugs you keep in the house.
 - Write or call lawmakers, urging more - and longer - treatment programs.
 - Approve funding for police, fire and education programs at Town Meetings.
 - Form community coalitions.
 Stoughton did that four years ago after a series of drug overdoses in town. School officials, clergy, sports leaders, students, police, parents and treatment specialists formed Operating Against Substances in Stoughton (OASIS), a drug prevention coalition to figure out what to do. The town now organizes forums for parents and students, after-school programs, a junior police academy, free drug counseling, a 14-week parenting program and hosts the Learn to Cope parental support group's weekly meetings at the police station. Each month, more than 40 people from OASIS meet at the police station
 "I don't think the politicians can fix these problems," said Robert Devine, chairman of the group's steering committee. "It has got to be the people who are going to be around. ... People have to be serious about the drug problems in their communities. You can't change what you can't acknowledge."
 Easton brought in a consultant to work with the high school staff after a series of overdoses, hosted forums for the community on heroin at local churches and works with Dr. Michael Dern, the Page 2

school's physician, to get young people help quickly. The schools also hired an adjustment counselor for the high school and junior high school and have a full-time school resource officer in the schools thanks to a Proposition 2½ override passed by voters last year, said William Simmons, Easton's school superintendent.
 Two Massachusetts high schools - one in Dartmouth, the other in New Bedford - and a school in Indiana use literature focused on the issue by including "Losing Jonathan," the book by Robert Waxler and Linda Waxler of Dartmouth detailing their son's battle with heroin and his death.
 "It brings home to them that this is not just about a single, isolated event. It is about a family," Robert Waxler said. "One story will hopefully evoke another story."
 And education goes beyond the classroom. "We are dealing with dentists, cautioning them about using OxyContin and educating parents to see if there are other alternatives to OxyContin when it's prescribed - and to make sure they really need it," Norfolk County District Attorney William Keating said.
 Stopping children from using any drugs, alcohol or cigarettes - not just heroin - is the foundation of prevention, several said.
 "Nobody wakes up one morning and starts smoking crack, no one wakes up and starts using heroin," Raynham officer Louis F. Pacheco, that town's school resource officer, said.
 Botticelli said education needs to be done early. "The earlier kids use tobacco and drinking, the earlier they are to develop more severe problems," he said.

 Maureen Boyle can be reached at mboyle@enterprisenews.com.