AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 Five adults were treated for suspected drug overdoses early Wednesday outside a bar in downtown Austin, with one patient found in respiratory arrest, authorities said.<\/p>\n
Austin-Travis County EMS, Austin Fire Department and Austin police were called to the 300 block of East Sixth Street at about 2:20 a.m. after 911 dispatchers received multiple calls reporting overdose symptoms among people in and around Shakespeare’s bar, EMS Capt. Christa Stedman said.<\/p>\n
All five patients received Narcan, with some requiring multiple doses from both first responders and bystanders at the scene, Stedman said. <\/p>\n
EMS transported four of the patients to area hospitals in stable condition, including the patient who had been in respiratory arrest. The fifth patient refused transport.<\/p>\n
Six ambulances, two community health paramedics and three EMS commanders responded to the scene, according to Stedman.<\/p>\n
Austin police Cpl. Matthew Nonweiler said officers were staged nearby, near Sixth Street and Trinity Street, as part of standard bar-close procedures and were on scene within a short distance of Shakespeare’s.<\/p>\n
Nonweiler said investigators believe the overdoses stemmed from a “bad batch” of drugs and that all of the cases appeared consistent with opioid-related overdoses. He said he “would not be surprised” if fentanyl was involved.<\/p>\n
“There is no quality control. There is no guarantee what’s in it,” Nonweiler said of narcotics purchased on the street. He urged the public not to risk their lives using them.<\/p>\n
Police said they were working with downtown bar staff to gather information and were asking anyone with knowledge of the incident to contact Austin Crime Stoppers at (512) 472-8477. Nonweiler said the case would be referred to APD’s narcotics conspiracy unit.<\/p>\n
Stedman said it was the first mass-casualty overdose incident downtown since a surge of overdoses in spring 2024.<\/p>\n
Officials did not release the ages, genders or identities of the patients Wednesday, saying only that all five were adults.<\/p>\n
Stedman and Nonweiler both credited bystanders, including bar staff, with performing CPR and administering Narcan before first responders arrived. Nonweiler said Narcan is often available at downtown businesses and carried by residents.<\/p>\n
This story is developing and will be updated as more information becomes available.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 Five adults were treated for suspected drug overdoses early Wednesday outside a bar in downtown…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":438022,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82,84,83],"class_list":["post-438021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=438021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438021\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/438022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=438021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=438021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=438021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}