Advocates want opioid lessons for school kids

Overdose crisis creates urgent need for curriculum updates, they implore

Advocates spurred by concerning rates of opioid overdoses among Alberta youth are urging the government to improve grade-school education on drug use.

“It’s more important than ever that students learn this,” said Amy Graves, president of Get Prescription Drugs off the Street Society.

On Tuesday, Graves and Petra Shultz, founder of advocacy group Moms Stop the Harm, which launched after Shultz’s son died from a fentanyl overdose in 2014, sent a letter asking Alberta’s health and education ministers to address the issue.

The Alberta government is midway through a curriculum redesign, with the first phases set to roll out next year.

Graves said it’s an opportunity to incorporate lessons on ways to reduce overdose risk, how to access support for drug use and addiction as well as relevant legislation such as the Good Samaritan Drug Overdose Act, which gives people immunity from possession charges if they call 911 in the case of an overdose.

“This is a matter of life or death that I feel cannot wait,” she said, pointing out that topics including the use of naloxone, which can reverse the effects of opioids, weren’t relevant to students years ago.

When her brother Joshua Graves, 21, fatally overdosed on the opioid hydromorphone following a party in Nova Scotia, drugs including fentanyl and carfentanil were unknown to many people.

“They hadn’t even made a blip on anyone’s radar,” Graves explained. “(The curriculum) is out of date.”

Data released Thursday suggests the number of visits to hospital emergency departments in Alberta due to opioid overdoses, as well as rates of hospitalization, have skyrocketed in recent years.

The report by the Canadian Institute for Health Information found, in 2016-17, there were an average of 11 emergency department visits per day attributed to opioid overdoses in Alberta. The most affected group was youths aged 15 to 24, with the fastestgrowing rate of such visits, tripling in five years.

Education Minister David Eggen said superintendents were provided with an Alberta Health fact sheet about fentanyl to share with teachers and parents in 2016.

“This resource is designed to help caregivers talk to the young people in their lives about the dangers of the drug with reliable information,” he said in a statement Friday.

Eggen added his office will be reaching out to the advocacy groups as lessons on health and wellness are redeveloped. “We agree this is an area that warrants urgency and have been working with school boards to make sure information is provided to students and their families.”

For Graves, her brother’s death is a reminder of the preventable trauma families encounter.

“I don’t want any other family to have to experience the pain that mine did,” she said. “The community impact of this issue is so much bigger than simply death.”

She explained there is still stigma about drug use — her brother didn’t fit the stereotype of a drug user held by some people.

“I’ m the first to admit… I thought, ‘This can’t happen to me,’ ” she said, adding that her brother was employed as an arborist and excited about his recent move to Nova Scotia. “My brother was the most happy, successful person.

“He didn’t have a substance use problem, there were no warning signs or a lead-up where you thought, ‘Tomorrow he’s not going to come home.’ ”

He was at a party with friends when he tried a drug that would later kill him. “The night he died he was buying new furniture for his apartment.”

This resource is designed to help caregivers talk to the young people in their lives about the dangers of the drug with reliable information.