When we talk about who we want to represent us in public office at any level, experience is the number one thing that gets mentioned as a reason to vote for someone. For obvious reasons, experience matters in a candidate.
But even more important is the kind of experience that a candidate brings to the table.
I can think of a lot of stories that illustrate this from my own experience. But today, I'd like to share just one- about the opioid crisis. I think it's particularly relevant now, given our Governor has apparently decided the same guy who said there were no racial disparities in health outcomes is qualified to solve this problem.
Ten years ago, the opioid crisis was at its worst for those of us in emergency services here in Virginia. It's far from great now- by the numbers, in fact, it’s quite the opposite- but you have to understand how different things were ten years ago. Big Pharma was still padding their bottom-line getting people addicted to narcotics. The stigma for seeking help for addiction was... again, still not great, but it was stifling then. And Narcan was still pretty much only available in the ER. Even most ambulances didn't have it available.
Beyond that, to illustrate the depth of the problem... so, until the pandemic, I volunteered with the Remote Area Medical Clinic down in Wise, Virginia. It's where people would line up for days in advance and sleep in their car to be able to access medical care, once a year. The nearby town of Norton, Virginia, had pharmacies in it that were dispensing more prescription narcotics than some entire European countries.
It was a huge problem. And our General Assembly said, hey- we have to do something about this!
And they were right! That is exactly the kind of problem that we expect the folks in the legislature to work on and solve. So, this group of legislators- with an aggregate of literally hundreds of years of 'experience' as politicians- set out to solve this problem once and for all.
But there was a problem. Despite the hundreds of years of experience they had... there wasn't a single emergency services provider amongst them. Not an emergency room doctor or nurse. Nary a firefighter or EMT. No crisis social workers or substance abuse counselors. There wasn't anyone there to go, "Woah- pump the brakes. Whatever we do, we have to make sure it doesn't just make things worse for the folks fighting this on the front lines!"
And, if you didn't catch the foreshadowing by now... that's exactly what happened.
What the legislature did, in effect, was make it a lot harder to write for prescription narcotics. Great! Pill mills needed to be shut down, unequivocally.
But they did that in the absence of any extra funding for addiction rehab programs.
They did that without any recognition that we couldn’t incarcerate our way out of this crisis.
They did that without holding Big Pharma accountable for prioritizing their bottom line over the health of our people; not even so much as sending a Sternly Worded Letter.
They did that without doing anything to break the stigma of having an opioid addiction.
And, worst of all, they refused to make Narcan more available. In fact, it took us years of fighting tooth and nail to fix that problem. I cannot tell you the rage and fury I had, as an ER Nurse, hearing a politician tell me confidently that if they made Narcan more available, it would only further the opioid crisis.
So, overnight, people went from having access to prescription grade, FDA inspected Vicodin, Percocet, etc... to whatever they could find on the street. Because people that were addicted to narcotics couldn't simply shrug their shoulders and go, "Well, drat, guess I better give it up!" Narcotic addiction literally changes your brain chemistry. These are miracle drugs when used therapeutically, but when not, they make it so that almost nobody can give them up without help.
We had... I don't know. Maybe a 500% increase in overdoses overnight. It was hell. It was truly hell, there was no other words for it.
I saw a lot of tragedies during that time, up until our efforts to fight to make Narcan readily available finally kicked in to start saving lives. But one in particularly has always sat with me. I've alluded to this story on a few occasions, including when I ran for the House of Delegates back in 2017. It was one of the first times I truly paid attention and realized how much power state legislators have over things that happen.
We had a rural EMS crew bring us in a young patient. School aged, in the "technically an adult but not really yet" window. Their friends had found them down, unresponsive, and EMS brought them to us. And we worked for an hour, or maybe an hour and a half to try and save their life. Understand that CPR is nowhere near as neat and clinical as it's portrayed on TV. Eventually, ribs break. Eventually, you're drilling into their bone marrow to get access to be able to administer lifesaving drugs. Eventually, frothy pink bubbles of blood start to spew out of their mouth and nose.
So it became clear it had all been too little, too late, and we finally ceased our efforts. As we began to filter out of the emergency department room, I began the walk out to triage, to find this young person's family. I was the primary nurse, so it was my job to find the family and move them somewhere private so our doctor could come talk to them. The registration clerks pointed me in the direction of a group of folks huddled in a corner, quietly talking amongst themselves, overtly stressed and worried. I walked up and asked if they were the patient's family; they said they were. Mom, dad, and a few close family friends.
"Would you please follow me?" I asked, gesturing in the direction of our designated Quiet Room. "The doctor would like to talk to you."
They followed me, hesitatingly, in the way families do when they slowly realize you're not leading them into the emergency department treatment area. The patients' mother, eyes wet and makeup streaked, came to this realization quickly, and stopped me.
"Tell me," she said, looking at me. "Where is my daughter? Is she okay? Is she..." and the word “alive” didn’t come out of her mouth, but it hung in the air nonetheless. I’m a parent, too. I understand the feeling of desperation. Of maybe if you don’t say the word out loud, it won’t make it real.
I didn't say anything. It wasn't my place. But even as grizzled and experienced as I am now, that's an almost impossible question to keep your composure even on. I attempted to stifle a choke of... something. Not really a sob. But something from deep inside me.
The mom began to scream and cry hysterically.
Because she realized she'd already seen her baby girl for the very last time.
I saw more stories like this than I would ever care to remember. And I remember all of them. Every one. But the reason that this one, in particular, sits in my mind is because when I got home that day, sitting on my kitchen table was a letter from my representative in the Virginia House of Delegates. The same one I ran against in 2017; the same one that retired rather than lose this seat this year. And when I opened it and read it, I discovered it was a congratulatory tome, patting himself on the back for all the hard work he'd done fighting the opioid crisis.
Now, that he sent out the letter isn't the worst part of this story. To be fair to him, I'm sure there are Democrats and Republicans across Virginia who sent similar missives. No, the problem is that I think he honestly thought he'd done a great job fighting the opioid crisis.
Truly. I think he and his colleagues were beaming with pride, thinking about all of the people their hard work and experience had helped... when, in reality, all they did was make things so much harder for all of us on the frontlines. All they did was make things so much harder for the people suffering from narcotic addiction. All they did was make things worse.
So, understand that when I talk about experience- about not all experience being built the same, about needing to have the right kind of experience in Richmond- this is what I mean. We need people who understand the difference between what Richmond wants to happen, and what actually happens on the ground in our communities, because they see it firsthand. They see the people who are hurting. They see the failures of our legislature to act to protect our people.
And aren't afraid to fight to fix it.
That's why I'm running for office. And that’s what I’m going to do.
I can’t promise to change the Republicans’ minds. I can’t promise I can make them listen.
But they’re damn well going to hear.
Kellen Squire is an emergency department nurse running for the Virginia House of Delegates. Donate today and help send a night-shift nurse to represent our district in Richmond!
