ArticlePublic health reports (Washington, D.C. : 1974)
Knowledge of Good Samaritan Laws and Beliefs About Arrests Among Persons Who Inject Drugs a Year After Policy Change in Baltimore, Maryland.
Article in Public health reports (Washington, D.C. : 1974). The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 28 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
28 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 55 citations in OpenAlex.
- How do naloxone-based interventions work to reduce overdose deaths: a realist review.Harm reduction journal · 2022Pooled it
- Regression Not-to-the-Mean: An Oddity of Regression, Illustrated With the Risk of Overdose Deaths.Statistics in medicine · 2026Article
- Contrasting perspectives and applications of the Good Samaritan Overdose Prevention Law: insights from people who use and distribute drugs in Rhode Island.Health & justice · 2026Article
- Community supervision during Oregon's partial decriminalization Measure 110: Criminal legal system involvement, overdose, and naloxone access.Drug and alcohol dependence reports · 2026Article
- Structural interventions and policing in the United States: a scoping review of public health literature.BMC public health · 2026Article
- Overdose-Related Cardiac Arrest in the Era of the Opioid Epidemic.Critical care clinics · 2026Review
- Article
- "You can't incarcerate yourself out of the drug problem in America:" A qualitative examination of Colorado's 2022 Fentanyl criminalization law.Health & justice · 2025Article
- "I don't let anybody die on my watch": perspectives on the intersection of community overdose response and emergency medical services among people who use drugs in Seattle, WA.Harm reduction journal · 2025Article
- Racial/ethnic inequality in homelessness and drug overdose deaths in US States.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2025Article
- "You take care of people, people will take care of you": Moral Economies and an Unpredictable Drug Market.PloS one · 2025Article
- Article
- Using qualitative system dynamics modeling to understand overdose bystander behavior in the context of Connecticut's Good Samaritan Laws and identify effective policy options.Harm reduction journal · 2024Article
- Overdose responses among rural people who use drugs: A multi-regional qualitative study.Harm reduction journal · 2024Article
- Motivation and context of concurrent stimulant and opioid use among persons who use drugs in the rural United States: a multi-site qualitative inquiry.Harm reduction journal · 2024Article
- Awareness and knowledge of drug decriminalization among people who use drugs in British Columbia: a multi-method pre-implementation study.BMC public health · 2024Article
- Exploring trauma and wellbeing of people who use drugs after witnessing overdose: A qualitative study.The International journal on drug policy · 2023Article
- Article
- Characteristics of events in which police responded to overdoses: an examination of incident reports in Rhode Island.Harm reduction journal · 2022Article
- Stayin' Alive in Little 5: Application of Sentiment Analysis to Investigate Emotions of Service Industry Workers Responding to Drug Overdoses.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesDelivering and receiving prompt medical care during an overdose are imperative to ensure survival. Good Samaritan laws encourage people to call 911 during an overdose by providing immunity from selected drug arrests (eg, low-level possession). However, it is unclear whether persons who inject drugs (PWID) are aware of and understand these laws and their implications. We examined awareness among PWID of the 2015 Good Samaritan law in Maryland and their beliefs about whether they could be arrested for calling 911 or having an overdose.
methodsWe surveyed 298 PWID in Baltimore, Maryland. We estimated the proportion who knew what the Good Samaritan law addressed and who believed they could be arrested for calling 911 or overdosing. We used a multivariate model to assess the association between harm-reduction services and knowledge of the Good Samaritan law or beliefs about getting arrested for calling 911 or overdosing.
resultsOf PWID, 56 of 298 (18.8%) knew what the Good Samaritan law addressed, 43 of 267 (16.1%) believed they could be arrested for calling 911, and 32 of 272 (11.8%) believed they could be arrested for having an overdose. After adjusting for demographic characteristics, accessing the syringe services program was associated with accurate knowledge and the belief that PWID could be arrested for calling 911; however, training in overdose reversal was not associated.
conclusionsMost PWID were unaware of the Good Samaritan law; this lack of awareness is a barrier to preventing overdose deaths. Educating PWID about Good Samaritan laws is essential, and such education should include police to ensure that law enforcement is congruent with Good Samaritan laws and does not perpetuate mistrust between police and PWID.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.