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Overdose surge in Carrick underscores struggle against opioid epidemic

PITTSBURGH — The opioid epidemic plaguing Western Pennsylvania is spiking in one Pittsburgh neighborhood and residents are struggling to combat it.

Nearly a dozen people have overdosed in Carrick in the last month, many of them in the bathrooms of businesses along the Brownsville Road corridor.

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"Our poor kids they're turning to heroin because it's so cheap,” resident George Marszalek said. "Right on Brownsville Road and there's cameras like you wouldn't believe."

Bebe Bercik, a former nurse, now works at a Dunkin Donuts in a strip mall on Brownsville. Unfortunately, she finds herself using her medical background in her new job, as well.

"The place I used to work at we had many overdoses,” she said. “In the bathroom? In the bathroom, yes. If anyone's in there for over 10 minutes I knock on the door, and if they don't respond, I go in."

In 2017, Carrick has already had 40 overdoses and five deaths, making it the neighborhood with the second-most opioid-related incidents in Pittsburgh, just behind Downtown.

Block watch groups are working hard with police and community resource officers to try to stop this devastating trend.

"It makes me sad for my community as a whole,” Marszalek said.

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