Notley whistling past graveyards as opioid crisis worsens

Open talk on difficult situation is needed, and conversation should begin at the top

If only the 500 Albertans who’ll die from opioid overdoses this year could designate themselves as incandescent light bulbs, then maybe our government would spare them more than an inconvenient afterthought.

Because that’s all the premier publicly provides, if her lack of pronouncements on the worst provincial health crisis we’ve known is anything to judge.

Yes, the silence is indeed deafening from Rachel Notley, despite a death rate from opioid overdoses now claiming more than an Albertan a day.

To say she’s passing the buck would be untrue — to actually hand something off, you first need to grasp it. No, Notley won’t get her hands dirty, despite hundreds of people she’s supposed to represent keeling over dead.

Instead, for example, we’re treated to ludicrous tit-for-tiny-tat legislative mudslinging between her government’s front benches and the opposition regarding the various measures in Saskatchewan’s recent budget. What, pray tell, has that to do with Alberta?

And while such ridiculous nonissues waste everyone’s energy, the slaughter goes on. If we can actually manage to get a few minutes of these busy people’s time, we’re blithely informed this doesn’t rate as a state of emergency. Oh really? Is there a death count to hit before it becomes one? A thousand corpses a year perhaps? Maybe two thousand? Do I hear any further bids on three thousand?

I’ve some skin in this game, to use that dreadful expression.

Perhaps if a few more MLAs had the same, we’d see some real discussion. Yes, when I’m awakened some nights, generally around 3 a.m., by my wife’s sobs over the death of her only child a year ago due to a fentanyl overdose, it cuts hard to the bone.

Since then, things have only got worse. Numbers last week show 51 Albertans died from Jan. 1 to Feb. 11. Yes, we’ve passed the one a day mark and the trajectory’s ever upward.

To suggest there’s an easy answer would be ludicrous. Simplistic solutions don’t exist. Oh sure, throw everyone involved in jail. Maybe send them to Drumheller Institution, where seven inmates recently succumbed to fentanyl poisoning.

And to those who imagine this doesn’t touch them — really?

Ask our police chief about the spike in crime — break-ins, car prowlings and such like.

He’ll tell you it’s because of the desperate need for cash to pay for more pills. Oops, here comes another insurance hike. Or the large spike in emergency room visits from OD sufferers — more taxpayer money spent and longer waits for everyone else.

This is a fiendishly tough issue with no easy answers. But we need to talk openly about it at the highest level because it is affecting everyone. That conversation should emanate from the top.

Perhaps, to start, we might publicly ponder why the average number of opioid prescriptions legally dispensed at community pharmacies in Alberta now stands at a mind-boggling 3.7 million a year, representing 637,000 people.

But Notley stays silent, letting some junior minister carry the can. Maybe it’s because this can’t be blamed on the previous Tory bunch and can’t be fixed by simply tossing taxpayers’ money at it. Still, money spent at least provides a clue to government priorities.

So when it comes to fighting opioid abuse, we’re told Alberta will spend “up to” $56 million this year. Yet, when battling climate change by cutting carbon emissions through free light bulbs and the like, we’ll spend 10 times that — $566 million — in the next three years.

Theoretically saving the planet is much nicer than saving actual Albertans, and in that regard, you can’t keep Notley quiet about her wondrous social licence.