By JoAnn Bocca-Rivieccio

Thursday at around 9 am 21 mothers and Fathers from MA/NH Team Sharing took a 12 hour bus ride to Washington DC.

We traveled to attend a well planned rally organized by many Friday morning at 10 am . We were there to make a loud and undeniable statement to the FDA …. To list a few myself presenting Somerville Overcoming Addiction ,a parent of a lost loved one Franke Rivieccio and member of Team Sharing , Domenic Esposito from the Spoon Project , Fed up , P.A.I.N and Ryan Hampton Recovery Voices and many others from all over the country . A special thanks to Cheryl Juaire from Team Sharing for the invite . You and all involed in the group are amazing caring
We as a TEAM held signs and pictures of our children that have passed due to an opioid overdose. chanted with our Marshall Randy Anderson from Fedup who by the way does a great job organizing our group. we chanted Hey Hey FDA why are to killing AMERICA today ,
More are dying everyday We need action right away
Wake up FDA Wake up FDA
200 DEAD everyday We blame the FDA
Domenic Esposito dropped a 800 pound Heroin spoon stamped with the FDA logo in front of the federal Food and Drug Administartion Building … where we all were .
Many laid down on the ground with tombstones on their chest in silence.
100’s of prescription bottles in which had this message inscribe on it PRUDUE PHARMA prescribed to you by the SACKLER FAMILY , OXYCONTIN extremely Addictive highlighted in yellow WILL KILL. Filled 4/05/19 RX # 400,000 DEAD with cross and bones, thrown around the scene … I was so impressed with the whole demonstration proud of all my fellow organizations that created such an impressive peaceful rally that last an hour and we left and left on the bus for another 12 hour journey home .
This protest came after a series of demonstrations at Museums funded by the Sackler family , we walked to the White House in October all well as protesting in front of the Sackler Art Museum in DC and the Perdue Pharma building in Stamford Conn a week later.
This Friday a Group will be at Harvards Sackler Museum at 12 noon to ask Harvard to remove the Sackler name from the building. There are also Tufts students and staff that want their university to remove the Sackler name as well.
Last weeks episode on the SOA show was of two students from Tufts talking about their concerns and feelings about Tufts involvement with the Sacklers .
Watch this episode http://www.somervillemedia.org or under Somerville Overcoming Addiction on Youtube
Our next show will be Dina Marie that is on the Maura Healy Opioid task force and will discuss the law suit the state of Massachusetts has filed against all responsible for this epidemic . Plus I will recap my trip to DC at 8pm Monday night please watch …… by logon online the above internet addresses or if in Somerville Channel 3