Today, Virginia Governor, Bob McDonnell, signed the epinephrine legislation.  This new law will require public schools in Virginia to adopt and implement policies to stock non-student specific epinephrine auto-injectors and identify appropriate trained staff to administer the life saving medication.  Last week, a $200,000 budget passed to support the purchase of epinephrin auto-injectors for Virginia public schools during the 2012-2013 school year.

New legislation has been signed by the Governor of Virginia to allow schools to stock non-student specific emergency epinephrine injections.  The new law will assist in the treatment of anaphylaxis to individuals in school who is experiencing anaphylaxis due to a known or unknown allergy, whether to foods or insect sting.  Up to 25% of epinephrine injection at the school setting involved individuals who had no prior history of allergies; first time experiences.  Without this law, those individuals, with no prior history of allergies, would not be able to receive this life saving medication unless one was prescribed to them by a physician.  In those cases, the individuals would wait for emergency medical personnel to arrive to the school to receive treatment for the reaction.  With anaphylaxis, minutes, even seconds, count and can be the difference between life and death.  For survivors, delayed treatment may result in permanent brain, kidney, or heart damage, from lack of oxygen (hypoxia)[1].

Loudoun Allergy Network Chairperson, Thanita Glancey, spoke with WTOP reporter, Neal Augenstein about the new law.  Read the full text article here: http://wtop.com/?nid=120&sid=2823354

A copy of the legislation can be found here: http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+SB656ER

[1] MD Guidelines  http://www.mdguidelines.com/anaphylactic-shock