US addiction counsellor creates smartphone app to thwart overdoses

Lucien Izraylov, an addiction counselor and former heroin user, holds his phone with an open app he created in his office in Evanston, Thursday Feb. 21, 2019. The smartphone app is design to connect drug users with volunteers who will make sure they don't overdose. (Abel Uribe/Chicago Tribune/TNS)

In his dozen years using heroin, Lucien Izraylov took pains to avoid detection. He was ashamed of what he was doing, so he almost always shot up alone. 

It’s a risky behaviour that can lead to a fatal overdose, especially as drugs are commonly tainted with the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl. But Izraylov, who says he now has years of sobriety behind him, thinks he has figured out a way to help.