AURORA | A member of Aurora city council is planning on asking local first responders to stop using ketamine on residents until a review of the city’s policies on the drug is completed.
Councilmember Curtis Gardner on Friday unveiled a proposal that would bar paramedics with Aurora Fire Rescue from using ketamine, the drug used to sedate 23-year-old Elijah McClain last year, until a review of the medication is finished in several months.
If passed, the measure would be in effect from when it is codified until 30 days after the consultant, Washington D.C.-based attorney Jonathan Smith, has submitted his report on polices related to McClain’s death to the city. The city retained Smith last month.
McClain, a Black massage therapist, was detained by a trio of Aurora police officers last August on his way home from a north Aurora convenience store. He was placed in a now-banned control hold and injected with 500 milligrams of ketamine after a passerby described him as “sketchy” to 911 dispatchers. He legally died three days later and was taken off life support three days after that. Documents have revealed that the paramedic who injected McClain overestimated his weight by nearly 80 pounds.
First responders’ use of ketamine in Colorado has been the subject of compounding scrutiny following McClain’s death. The state health department has said it will review the dose given to McClain, and look again at the waiver program that grants local agencies the ability to administer the drug.
State health officials have been granting health agencies waivers to use ketamine since 2013, though Aurora Fire didn’t begin using the substance until January 2019.
More than 100 Colorado health entities currently have waivers to use ketamine for “excited delirium,” a debated medical condition officials said McClain was experiencing in the moments before he went into cardiac arrest.
Gardner and other council members have questioned that diagnosis.
“A primary concern Councilmember Gardner and I share is EMS staff diagnosing ‘excited delirium’ in law enforcement related calls and the medical protocols that surround the diagnosis and administration,” Councilmember Nicole Johnston wrote in an email. “Until this is addressed and the investigation is concluded, we cannot in good conscience support the continued use.”
Local officials used the drug 18 times in the city last year and twice in the first six months of this year, according to a spokeswoman for the local fire agency.
Medical officials across the state administered ketamine 902 times between Jan. 1 2018 and June 30 of this year, according to state data. Nearly 17% of those incidents had some sort of complication reported.
Such complications were even higher last year, when 24% of the 457 ketamine doses given across the state resulted in some sort of problem. More than half of the issues were due to hypoxia, or oxygen deprivation.
Gardner plans on introducing the measure at a council study session on Sept. 14.