With red rockstar hair, black biker gloves, a spiked necklace, and a baby doll dress covered in hanging chains and orange flames, drag performer Kochina Rude steps onto the stage. The nighttime crowd fills the Oasis with applause. Her onstage assistant — a drag queen wearing a shimmering pink robe, heels, and a towel turban — hands out small Narcan inhalers to audience members like Halloween candy as Rude explains how to recognize and treat an overdose.

Rude has not come to one of the hottest queer dance clubs in San Francisco just to party or perform; she’s here to save lives.

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Rude’s live demonstrations include explaining that a person experiencing a fentanyl overdose may exhibit non-responsiveness, shallow breathing, or pale or blue skin, especially around their lips or fingernails. She says that after unsuccessfully trying to wake the user by yelling or painfully grinding your knuckles into their sternum, call 9-1-1, unpackage the Narcan inhaler, insert the nozzle into the person’s nose, and press the plunger to administer the medication. Then start CPR rescue breathing. She demonstrates.

Rude and fellow local drag performer Nicki Jizz are drag ambassadors with the city’s Overdose Prevention in Nightlife campaign. Launched in 2023 in partnership with the city’s Department of Public Health (SFDPH), the campaign seeks to raise awareness of overdose risk, provide access to Narcan, and educate as many people as possible to save lives.

“We have been passing out free naloxone [the proper name for Narcan] and doing trainings for audiences at drag shows at venues in SoMa, Castro, and the Mission, and by amplifying this work online with the help of our local drag ambassadors,” Dylan Rice, Project & Communications Manager at the San Francisco Entertainment Commission, tells LGBTQ Nation.

“The response has been a great success, locally and nationally. Since we launched, we have distributed nearly 400 doses of naloxone and trained over 1,200 attendees at these events at queer spaces.”

Last October, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy recognized the city’s campaign at the “White House Challenge to Save Lives from Overdose” event.

The White House noted that the campaign has led in-person trainings for staff at 18 nightlife businesses and is part of a larger national movement to fight opioid deaths. Similar educational awareness trainings involving Narcan have now been offered by the American Heart Association, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, the Dallas Area Rapid Transit Police Department, the National Hockey League, the North Carolina Council of Churches, United Airlines, and This Must Be the Place, a nonprofit providing free naloxone to attendees at music venues and festivals across the country.

“This campaign has helped deepen a sense of collective care in San Francisco’s queer nightlife scene,” Rice says. “It sends a clear message: We’ve got each other’s backs. By bringing public health into nightlife spaces in a way that feels relevant, welcoming, and even celebratory, we’re showing that harm reduction isn’t just about survival, it’s about community resilience.”

Rice notes that the campaign partnerships built between the Entertainment Commission, SFDPH, drag performers, and venue owners have not only created a strong foundation of trust and collaboration but have also motivated more venues to proactively seek out naloxone training and carry it as a standard safety practice.

“These relationships go beyond one campaign — they’ve sparked ongoing conversations about safety, health, and empowerment in nightlife culture,” Rice says. “From here, we want to continue this momentum and keep expanding the campaign’s reach and promoting ways that people can stay safe.”

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