NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. — Recovery Epicenter is a nonprofit organization that is giving away 1,400 boxes of Narcan and training people how to use it.
Their goal is to save lives by teaching people how to reverse an opioid overdose.
Brian Zitt understands addiction. He started doing drugs and drinking alcohol as a teenager.
"I was introduced to painkillers my sophomore year of high school when I sustained a back injury diving into second base," said Brian Zitt, a recovering addict and counselor at Rockland Treatment Center.
By his 20's, Zitt says his addiction was out of control.
"I was eating handfuls of Vicodin every single day. My body was so dependent on it. I would be so horribly sick that I couldn’t get out of bed unless I drank a fifth of vodka by noon," said ZItt.
Eventually, ZItt was arrested on felony charges for signing doctors names on prescription pads. He says the arrest helped save his life.
"Everybody’s rock bottom is different. Unfortunately sometimes that’s a casket. For me it was a jail cell," said Zitt.
To get out of a 10-year prison sentence, the judge agreed to send Zitt to a Christian rehab facility called Teen Challenge.
"For the first time in my life I saw a light at the end of the tunnel and it wasn’t a freight train," said Zitt.
Now Zitt is a pastor, a counselor, and spends his life helping to save others. That's why he is advocating for people to take the free Narcan that Recovery Epicenter is giving away so that they can help save a life.
"If those 1400 doses save just one life, they’re completely worth it," said Zitt.
This giveaway is from 6 to 8 p.m. on Tuesday at Calvery Chapel Worship Center in New Port Richey. The Health Department will be giving out free Hepatitis A and B vaccines at this event and anyone who starts them can continue the series at the health department for free. For more information on Narcan visit recoveryepicenterfoundation.org.
