BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Bloomington is in the middle of a public health crisis.

Last year, 1,118 Indiana residents lost their lives due to an opioid-related overdose. This number is up 75 percent since 2011, according to the same data.

However, the overall number of overdoses is down this year and experts say it could be related to the Indiana Department of Public Health’s response to needle exchanges popping up across the state.

Just last week, in Marion County, a hearing took place for the proposal of a needle exchange program in Indianapolis.

The proposal called on the city council to look to Bloomington’s needle exchange as an example of a successful program.

IRA, the Indiana Recovery Alliance, is a non-profit needle exchange based in Bloomington, Indiana.

The program serves both active and former drug users by providing needles, clean water, overdose prevention drugs like naloxone, and education about the dangers of opioid abuse.

Operating solely on donations and grants, the Indiana recovery alliance has collected over 300,000 used needles since the program began in 2016. They have also distributed 7,000 doses of naloxone and have received 700 reports of overdose reversals.

For founder Chris Abert,  it is all about harm reduction.

“All of us take risks every day and we take safety precautions to mitigate the consequences,” Abert said. “It may be wearing a seatbelt in a car, or football players wearing safety equipment. In this case, it is the use of clean syringes.”

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Many of the volunteers working at IRA are former substance abuse disorder victims who seek to help those in situations they once encountered.

Tiffany Purtlebaugh, who volunteers 3-days a week at the needle exchange, once sought help from the organization.

“Two years ago, I came in to get needles and they noticed how swollen my hand was and the pain I was in,” Purtlebaugh said.

Tiffany was suffering from a blood clot in her left hand, causing her fingers and wrist to swell and turn purple.

Abert drove her to the ER where he says nurses and doctors are sometimes hesitant to help because of the overwhelming amount of opioid-related ER visits.

At the hospital, Tiffany was greeted by a nurse who held her hand and treated her with kindness while they waited to see a doctor.

“Normally, I avoided going to the hospitals because I was so embarrassed to ask for help from the nurses and doctors,” Tiffany said. “But this nurse made me feel welcome and human again.”

For Tiffany, the simple kindness she received from the nurse and the support from Chris Abert and the Indiana Recovery Alliance led her to seek treatment.

Two years later she is drug-free and is finishing up her nursing school at Ivy Tech.

Abert says the program is not just about exchanging needles.

“We provide everything from real human connection to HIV and Hepatitis C test kits,” Abert said.

Still, such programs remain controversial around the country but Abert says more research and more data will reveal how crucial their role is to public health.