Fentanyl

Under a new state law, anyone who provides certain drugs to a person who dies after taking them may be prosecuted for second-degree murder — whether they received money for the drugs or shared them freely.

As the fight against the opioid epidemic continues, new medicines promise to help. But experts say old remedies shouldn't be forgotten.

Three UNC-Chapel Hill students have become unexpected distributors of the life-saving drug naloxone in a college town where several students have recently died from opioid poisonings.

Counties are starting to get their first payments from the more than $50 billion dollar windfall secured from drug manufacturers and pharmacies for their role in the opioid epidemic. A public radio collaborative investigated what programs are being funded.

North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein and state lawmakers gathered for a ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday for the unveiling of the Drug Chemistry and Toxicology units.

Only the person who has overdosed and the person who calls for help are shielded from most prosecutions for substance possession. Sometimes even those people find themselves in legal jeopardy. A new bill would provide protection for everyone at a scene from arrest and from prosecution for nonviolent offenses.

The decision could make the life-saving drug more accessible. Emergent BioSolutions, the drug company that produces Narcan, said it anticipates it will be on store shelves by late summer.

An increase in drug overdose deaths is prompting new legislation to target people who sell fentanyl and other opioids.

North Carolina saw record highs in opioid overdose hospitalizations and deaths in 2022.

Prosecutors said Poteat worked as a contract nurse at a Winston-Salem hospital from July to November 2020 and had access to a machine that stored vials of injectable hydromorphone, an opioid derived from morphine.