Every August 31, International Overdose Awareness Day asks us to remember the people we have lost to overdose, stand with the people who loved them, challenge the stigma surrounding drug use, and recommit ourselves to preventing more deaths.

At Students for Sensible Drug Policy, remembrance must also mean action.

The United States is finally seeing meaningful progress. Provisional CDC data estimate 69,973 overdose deaths in 2025, nearly 14% fewer than in 2024 and the third consecutive year of decline. Opioid-involved overdose deaths fell from an estimated 55,296 in 2024 to 44,564 in 2025.

That progress matters. And it didn’t happen because America intensified the War on Drugs.

Public health officials have pointed to expanded access to naloxone, evidence-based treatment, overdose prevention and response, and other harm reduction interventions as important contributors to falling overdose deaths.

In other words: harm reduction works.

But nearly 70,000 overdose deaths in a single year is still nearly 70,000 too many. Sustaining this progress means confronting not only overdose itself, but the drug policies that have helped make drug use more dangerous.

Overdose Is a Drug Policy Problem

America’s overdose crisis did not develop in a vacuum.

Decades of prohibition have not eliminated drug use or drug demand. Instead, the War on Drugs has pushed the production and sale of drugs into an unregulated illicit market where there is no quality control, reliable labeling, standardized dosing, or meaningful way for consumers to know exactly what they are getting.

Illicitly manufactured fentanyl illustrates the consequences. Fentanyl itself is an important medicine and, when produced and administered in known doses, has legitimate medical uses. The crisis is not simply the existence of fentanyl; it is an increasingly potent and unpredictable illicit supply in which people often cannot reliably know what they are getting or at what dose.

Fentanyl can be present in heroin and counterfeit pills as well as drugs sold as cocaine or methamphetamine, sometimes without the person using them knowing it is there.

That unpredictability isn’t incidental to the overdose crisis. It is one of the consequences of prohibition.

The lesson of the overdose crisis should not be that we need to wage war on another drug. We have tried that approach for more than half a century. The lesson is that people are safer when they have accurate information, a more predictable supply, access to lifesaving tools, and policies that prioritize their health over punishment.

And too often, the same punitive approach that created a more dangerous drug supply is applied to the tools people use to protect themselves from it. Stigma, criminalization, drug paraphernalia laws, funding restrictions, and other barriers have made it harder for people who use drugs to access drug checking, naloxone, sterile supplies, honest drug education, and other evidence-based interventions.

SSDP exists to change that.

Students for Sensible Drug Policy is the largest youth-led grassroots network dedicated to replacing the War on Drugs with policies rooted in evidence, compassion, and human rights — policies that make sense.

That means fighting to change harmful laws. But it also means keeping people alive while we do it.

That’s the idea behind HOPE: Harm Reduction and Overdose Prevention Education.

HOPE Puts Overdose Prevention in Your Hands

SSDP’s HOPE program combines practical overdose education with the tools people need to put that knowledge into action.

The free, self-paced training in the SSDP Connect app takes roughly one hour and teaches participants how to prevent, recognize, and respond to an opioid overdose — including how to administer naloxone and provide rescue breathing.

Everyone is eligible to participate. After completing the app-based training, participants can request a free personal HOPE Harm Reduction Kit so they have the tools they just learned how to use.

And for people who want to take the next step, SSDP offers a pathway to become a HOPE Trainer, equipping participants to bring overdose prevention education to others and request multiple kits and supplies for distribution in their communities.

We don’t want someone to finish a harm reduction course simply knowing about lifesaving tools.

We want those tools in their hands — and we want them to know what to do with them.

What’s Inside a HOPE Harm Reduction Kit — and Why?

Everything in a HOPE kit serves a purpose. Together, the materials address different points at which an overdose can be prevented, recognized, responded to, or reversed — as well as the policies that can determine whether someone feels safe asking for emergency help.

Fentanyl Test Strips: Information Before an Overdose Happens

Fentanyl is not inherently “bad.” It is a powerful opioid with legitimate and important medical uses, including treating severe pain and providing anesthesia. Like other drugs, its effects and risks depend on factors including dose, route of administration, individual tolerance, and what other substances are being used.

The particular danger in today’s illicit drug supply is unpredictability.

Illicitly manufactured fentanyl is extremely potent, and people may encounter it in heroin, counterfeit pills, or other drugs without knowing how much fentanyl is present — or, in some cases, without expecting fentanyl at all. In a prohibited and unregulated market, there are no reliable labels telling someone what a substance contains or how strong it is.

That’s where fentanyl test strips come in.

Fentanyl test strips help people identify whether fentanyl is present in a substance before they use it. They aren’t perfect, and they can’t tell someone how much fentanyl is present, but they provide another piece of information someone can use to make a lower-risk decision — whether that’s using less, not using alone, making sure naloxone is nearby, or deciding not to use that substance.

Drug checking isn’t about telling people that fentanyl — or any drug — is inherently good or bad. It’s about giving people accurate information so they can make informed decisions about what they put into their own bodies.

That’s especially important in a drug market shaped by prohibition. When policy makes accurate labeling and regulated supply impossible, harm reduction tools like fentanyl test strips can help return some information and agency to the person actually taking the risk.

We’re grateful to Overdrive Defense for donating fentanyl test strips to HOPE, helping SSDPers and community members put that principle into practice.

Standard-Dose Naloxone: Reverse the Overdose

Naloxone gives someone the ability to intervene when an opioid overdose is already happening.

HOPE kits include RiVive 3 mg nasal naloxone, generously donated by Harm Reduction Therapeutics, the nonprofit pharmaceutical company that developed RiVive.

And we’re intentional about providing standard-dose naloxone.

The goal when administering naloxone is to restore adequate breathing, not necessarily to immediately restore full consciousness. Giving more naloxone than necessary can precipitate more severe opioid withdrawal, which in turn can increase the risk of a future overdose. HOPE therefore teaches participants to focus on breathing, administer naloxone appropriately, provide rescue breathing, and give additional naloxone when needed.

Naloxone is remarkably effective at reversing opioid overdose, and getting it into more hands is one of the concrete harm reduction interventions helping save lives.

The more people who carry it, the more likely it is that someone will have it when seconds matter.

CPR Masks: Because Breathing Is the Emergency

Naloxone is enormously important, but administering it isn’t the entirety of overdose response.

Opioid overdose kills primarily by suppressing breathing.

That’s why HOPE teaches rescue breathing, and why our kits include CPR masks. A CPR mask provides a barrier that can make someone more comfortable providing rescue breaths while naloxone takes effect and emergency help is on the way.

That matters because responding to an overdose isn’t simply about giving someone medication. It’s about keeping oxygen moving through their body and keeping them alive.

Good Samaritan Information: Because Fear Shouldn’t Stop a 911 Call

HOPE kits also contain something that can’t reverse an overdose but can remove a critical barrier to getting help: information about Good Samaritan policies.

Good Samaritan laws are designed to address one of the dangerous consequences of the War on Drugs: people being afraid to call 911 because they fear arrest or punishment.

Protections vary by jurisdiction, but these laws generally provide some degree of legal protection for people who seek emergency medical assistance for themselves or another person experiencing an overdose. The principle is simple: saving a life should take priority over punishing someone for drug possession.

And SSDPers have helped make those protections a reality.

For years, SSDP chapters and student advocates have organized for Good Samaritan and medical amnesty policies on college campuses and in state legislatures, making the case that nobody should have to weigh someone’s life against the possibility of punishment before calling for help.

That advocacy has saved lives. But the work isn’t finished.

Protections still vary significantly depending on where someone lives or goes to school. They can contain exceptions, provide protection from only certain offenses, or leave people uncertain about whether calling 911 could still expose them or someone else to consequences.

We can change that, too.

SSDPers can continue pushing campuses and policymakers to adopt Good Samaritan policies where they don’t exist, strengthen protections where they do, educate people about their rights, and eliminate punitive policies that discourage people from seeking emergency help.

That’s why policy education belongs alongside naloxone and overdose-response training.

A fentanyl test strip can help prevent an overdose.

A CPR mask can help someone breathe during one.

Naloxone can help reverse one.

And a strong Good Samaritan policy can help ensure that fear of punishment doesn’t stop someone from calling for help.

That’s HOPE in practice: education, lifesaving tools, and policy change working together.

From One Kit to a Community

HOPE is designed to turn individual education into community action.

Complete the app-based training and you can request a free personal HOPE Harm Reduction Kit.

Want to go further? Become a HOPE Trainer.

HOPE Trainers are equipped to bring overdose prevention and harm reduction education into their communities and can request multiple harm reduction kits and supplies for distribution.

That distinction matters. We aren’t interested in simply shipping boxes of supplies. We want to pair those supplies with education so that people understand what they’re distributing, how the tools work, and how to talk to others about overdose prevention.

SSDP also offers in-person and virtual HOPE trainings for campuses, organizations, workplaces, conferences, festivals, and communities. We bring harm reduction education and supplies directly to events through SSDP’s Chill Zones, creating spaces where people can decompress, access resources, and learn without judgment.

Because the goal isn’t simply to create more people who know what naloxone is.

It’s to create more people carrying it. More people who know how to use it. More people checking their drugs. More people prepared to respond to an overdose. More people equipped to train their communities. And more people organizing to change the policies that make drug use more dangerous in the first place.

Harm Reduction Saves Lives. Policy Change Can Save More.

The recent decline in overdose deaths should give us hope. But it should also teach us something.

For decades, the dominant response to drugs in the United States was punishment: more criminalization, more arrests, harsher sentences, and increasingly aggressive attempts to eliminate the supply of prohibited drugs.

We are still living with the consequences.

Harm reduction starts somewhere fundamentally different. It starts with the recognition that people who use drugs are people whose lives are worth saving.

When we make naloxone widely available, people can reverse overdoses.

When we give people tools to better understand what’s in the illicit drug supply, they can make more informed decisions.

When we teach people rescue breathing, they can respond when someone’s breathing stops.

When Good Samaritan protections reduce the fear associated with calling 911, people are better able to seek emergency help.

And when we replace punishment and stigma with evidence, compassion, and practical tools, we give people a better chance to survive.

That’s why overdose prevention can’t be separated from the movement to end the War on Drugs. We need harm reduction interventions today and policy change that makes them more accessible tomorrow.

This International Overdose Awareness Day, Take HOPE

International Overdose Awareness Day is a day to remember.

It’s also a day to act. Take an hour and learn how to save a life. Download the SSDP Connect app and complete the free HOPE training. Request your personal harm reduction kit. Carry naloxone. Learn how to use fentanyl test strips. Know your local Good Samaritan protections. Talk to the people you care about.

Want to do more? Become a HOPE Trainer and help bring this knowledge and these tools to your community.

And if you’re part of a campus, organization, workplace, conference, festival, or community that could benefit from overdose prevention education, reach out to SSDP about bringing an in-person or virtual HOPE training to you.

We are enormously grateful to Harm Reduction Therapeutics and Overdrive Defense for donating materials that help make this work possible. Their support helps us turn harm reduction from an idea into something people can carry in their pockets, backpacks, cars, and communities.

We cannot bring back the people we have lost. But we can honor them by fighting for a world where fewer people are lost tomorrow.

Take the training. Carry the tools. Share the knowledge. Change the policies. Save lives.