USM hosts fentanyl awareness conference

HATTIESBURG, Miss. (WDAM) - The University of Southern Mississippi hosted an event Wednesday night focused on increasing awareness of the drug, fentanyl.

A conference at the Thad Cochran Center was hosted by Sigma Alpha Lambda. an academic honor society.

An online presentation was made by the group “Song for Charlie.”

“It’s named for college student Charlie Ternan, who died in 2020 after he took a counterfeit prescription drug laced with fentanyl.

“(Students) going through midterms this week and then we have finals coming up, a lot of students are going to be looking for ways to deal with stress and deal with anxiety and we’re trying to help them turn away from drugs,” said Rachel Brown, president of USM’s Sigma Alpha Lambda chapter.

The Mississippi State Department of Health reported 51 deaths involved fentanyl in 2022.

That’s an 18 percent increase from 2021.

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