128. BirdieLight: Fighting the Fentanyl Epidemic with Beth Weinstock

The numbers are astounding and the stories are heartbreaking. 

Fentanyl-associated incidents are the number one cause of death for people aged eighteen to forty-five in America – more than car accidents, more than illness, more than anything – and today’s guest, Beth Weinstock is bravely doing something about it.

We first talk about her early career as a doctor, owning and growing her own practice for seventeen years, and how her story came full circle – back to creativity and disruption after a childhood interest in creative writing was passed over for med school.

Founding her own non-profit, BirdieLight, with her daughter after the tragic passing of her son, Eli, to fentanyl ingestion in 2020, she’s now committed to distributing the critical education and overdose response materials that young people need to avoid the same fate.

BirdieLight is an online information resource and traveling workshop that visits schools, clubs, and any other organized gathering of today’s youth to tell Eli’s story; to inform kids, their parents, and their teachers about the wide prevalence of fentanyl in other recreational street drugs; and to distribute life saving narcan doses and fentanyl test strips.

Her courage is to be commended, in telling her full story on the podcast, and in taking action to lessen the impact of this deadly trend in our society. It’s not the 70s anymore, that much is for sure. And it’s why her work is so important.

To learn more, visit: thegravitypodcast.com

Resources:

• Website: birdielight.org
• Instagram: @birdie.light
• Facebook: BirdieLight
• Twitter: @birdielight2021
• Linkedin: Beth Weinstock M.D.
• Twitter: @bethweinstock
• Read: Beth’s guest column at cleveland.com

Gravity is produced by Crate Media.