First responders Manny Rodriguez, Pia Hofmann, Det. Anthony Favara, of the NYPD and Lt. Stephen Butler, of the Port Authority Police, speak next to the "Last Beam" during the dedication ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial Museum in Ne
First responders (L-R) Manny Rodriguez, Pia Hofmann, Det. Anthony Favara, of the NYPD and Lt. Stephen Butler, of the Port Authority Police, speak next to the "Last Beam" during the dedication ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial Museum in New York May 15, 2014, Reuters/John Munson/Pool

Officers of the New York Police Department are likely to carry emergency antidotes for heroin overdose so that they can possibly save several lives.

NYPD is supported by the New York state Attorney General's Office so that it gets $1.17 million for paying for 19,500 kits. The money is expected to come from forfeiture cases, civil and criminal. Those kits will help patrol officers who include those in charge of transit and housing bureaus, New York Post reported. There are two sets of an inhaler of naloxone and a syringe in the kit which is marketed as Narcan as its brand name. There is a "how to" guide in the kits as well. Each kit has a two-year shelf life and costs around $60.

According to New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's statement, officers equipped with such kits will save lives. "By providing NYPD police officers with naloxone, we are making this stunningly effective overdose antidote available in every corner of the five boroughs," Schneiderman said, "This program will literally save lives." The Verge reported that previous programmes had shown "promising results." Quincy Police in Massachusetts used Narcan 221 times since 2010. There were 211 cases when the officers were able to reverse the effect of overdose, which means that the success rate is more than 95 per cent. Schneiderman said that there had been 563 lives saved by using the drug in New York's Suffolk County in 2013.

Cases of heroin abuse have dramatically grown in the United States in recent years. Public health and law enforcement officials are forced to take necessary action. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that there were 38,000 cases of deaths due to drug overdose in 2010. Around 60 per cent of those deaths were linked to pharmaceuticals. Justice Department data shows that the instances of death due to heroin overdose have increased 45 per cent from 2006 to 2010. Philip Seymour Hoffman's death due to heroin overdose in February 2014 caused further attention to the already-critical case after the actor had been found dead in his New York apartment.