COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – A central Ohio non-profit organization fighting the opioid epidemic is getting a boost of support this holiday season.

The organization, This Must Be the Place, travels to music festivals around the country, handing out free naloxone and offering education to those in attendance. 

Columbus native William Perry co-founded the organization in January of 2022 with his wife Ingela. His story is one he says is all too common.

“Unfortunately for me and my friend group that led to a lot of drug use, some addiction for myself, incarceration,” Perry said. “My other friends who were still out on the streets when fentanyl came about, that unfortunately led to their untimely deaths.”

While in prison, he found sobriety and got a degree in social work. After his release, he went to work helping those in situations like the one he himself was once in.

“What I learned from working at these recovery centers and nonprofits was you got to keep people alive in order to give them a chance to recover,” Perry said.

The organization travels to music festivals around the country, passing out Kloxxado, which is a double dose of naloxone, and educating those in attendance.

“It was important for me to go, you know, see, meet people in a very safe space, but a space where they also might be open-minded to the fact that whether or not they use drugs, they might be around somebody at some point in time that does a music festival. We can all agree is that place,” Perry said.

One of the nonprofit’s largest supporters is the Ohio-operated pharmaceutical company Hikma.

“We’re really proud to be able to partner with someone like this, Must Be The Place, to make sure that gets to those who need it,” Chris Bonny, Hikma’s vice president of marketing and brand operations, said. “It’s also really meaningful to do that with a group like this that’s based here in Ohio and has grown so extraordinarily over the last two years.”

National data shows more than 100,00 Americans lost their lives to a drug overdose in 2021, many of those attributed to fentanyl.

Perry said that, to date, This Must Be The Place has given away more than 40,000 doses, about $2.1 million worth of the free, life-saving drug.

“It means the world, you know, it’s all about giving back,” Perry said. “Because I could think of a thousand different forks in the road where there could have been someone who helped me out, who gave me a leg up and they weren’t there. And so now just getting to be that person, if I only get to be that person for one individual, I’ve come out and I’ve done what I chose to do.”

This Must Be The Place plans on going to events like Lollapalooza, Governors Ball and Austin City Limits. He also said the group will be at Hikma on Wednesday, giving kits to employees to help spread the group’s message.

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