Joe Murphy grew up in West Virginia and has built his career around a single question: how do you put lifesaving help in the hands of an ordinary person at the exact moment it is needed? He is the creator of the ONEbox®, one of the most innovative overdose prevention tools in the country, along with Rex the Rx and a number of other technology-driven responses to the opioid epidemic.
The idea for the ONEbox® came directly out of what Joe watched happen in his own hometown as the opioid crisis took hold. The design is deliberately simple. Both the ONEbox® Classic and the ONEbox® Co-Location kit open to a one-minute emergency video, available in English and Spanish, that walks a bystander through recognizing an overdose and administering naloxone, even if that person has never had a minute of training. Groups and organizations that want more depth can use an extended training version.
Joe has partnered with organizations including Recovery Point, CCSAPP, and Lily’s Place, helping draw both public attention and significant funding toward West Virginia’s opioid crisis. As CEO of Murphy Media in Huntington, West Virginia, the company behind the ONEbox®, his background in media has shaped how he reaches people at scale. He has organized naloxone training at music festivals, including an event that trained more than 11,000 concertgoers and stands as the largest one-time naloxone training ever held.
For close to seven years, Joe has worked side by side with Dr. Susan Murphy, a collaboration that has carried ONEboxes into all 50 states. The thinking behind all of it has never changed: the right system, in the right hands, at the right moment, saves a life.