Drug overdose death toll up a whopping 90%
Prevention site may depend on provincial election outcome
Niagara’s drug overdose death toll climbed by “a staggering” 90 per cent last year — despite efforts by the region’s health department and local agencies to combat the opioid crisis.
And although the Ministry of Health has approved a temporary overdose prevention site for St. Catharines in the hope of keeping that number from increasing, associate medical officer of health Andrea Feller said details needed to establish that facility will not be provided until after this week’s provincial election.
“This is a staggering number,” said Welland Coun. George Marshall at Tuesday’s Niagara Region health committee meeting, while discussing a report saying 76 people died from drug overdoses in 2017 — compared to 40 a year earlier.
“Some (deaths) are too many, 90 (per cent) is an epidemic,” he said.
“If that was the flu or the measles, we’d be screaming from the rooftops.”
Feller said she shares Marshall’s frustration regarding the report, while also lamenting delays in obtaining timely information about the use of opioids such as fentanyl.
“The really annoying thing with the data is that it is now five months behind, but we’re supposed to be happy about that because it was 18 months behind,” she added.
Meanwhile, Feller said details about the overdose prevention site — approved for a six-month trial run in St. Catharines — are “on hold” pending the outcome of the provincial election on Thursday.
Although Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford has repeatedly stated he is opposed to overdose prevention sites, Feller
later said the current provincial government has taken steps to ensure the temporary site approved for St.Catharines would move forward, regardless of the election outcome.
“They’re approved and they’re going to be fully funded. That’s what we heard,” she said.
Plans to establish a permanent overdose prevention site, however, will depend on how many people use the temporary site. About half of overdose deaths, she added, occur among people who are using drugs such as fentanyl alone in their homes.
Asked if there was more that Niagara could do to combat the problem, Feller said: “If there were something that we were missing, we would see places like Vancouver and other places that have been dealing with this for much longer — we’d see them improving and they’re not either. Everybody worldwide is struggling with this.”
Feller said organizations associated with Overdose Prevention Network of Niagara are “overturning every rock possible, and looking at every possible option to make a difference, to make changes quicker.”
And she hopes efforts that have been put in place — such as the distribution of naloxone kits used to reverse the effects of overdoses — will begin to have an impact in the months and years to come.
“I think eventually everything that we’re doing has to work, for sure,” she said. “But at the same time, we have to be aware that what this has uncovered is a massive problem in society around addictions and mental health.”