LOUISE CAMERON
Louise Cameron volunteers with the Overdose Prevention Society along with other harm-reduction groups in the Downtown Eastside. “All of it is a love letter to my sons,” Cameron says ruefully about the advocacy work she has taken on in the last few years.
Her oldest son Ken committed suicide at age 29, which she believes stemmed from the shame associated with his long battle with drug addiction. Her second son Ian, 31, continues to battle addiction today. He is unable to shake his habit, she said, because of B.C.’s fractured and underfunded treatment system.
Cameron, along with her geologist husband, could get instant treatment in a private facility for Ian whenever they pulled out their credit cards and paid the expensive bills. But the quality of the care provided and the qualifications of the workers varied widely.
At times when the Camerons were unable or unwilling to pay, they were exasperated by the weeks-long wait for publicly funded treatment beds — a wait that can be a death sentence for some.
“We are a nice, middle-class, well-educated family, but God help the people who can’t pull their credit card out,” she said.
“Addiction is a terminal disease if not arrested — what other disease are we selling our houses to fund treatment for?”
Society must accept drug addiction as a medical challenge that could happen to any family, she insisted. Her son Ian was an honour-roll student and a highlevel soccer player, her husband coached their kids’ sports, and she was on the school’s parent advisory council.
Today, she is proud of the courage Ian displays as he tries again and again to break the cycle of addiction.
“I have huge admiration and pride for any of these young men and women who keep trying,” she said.
“This is a treatable disease, and that is what’s so heartbreaking and infuriating.”
She hopes for the day when politicians and taxpayers will fund drug treatment in the way public money finally flowed to AIDS research.
“I strongly believe you could equate this crisis to what happened with AIDS in the ’70s and ’80s. In those days people thought it was only happening to … somebody else and that they were ‘throwaway’ people.”
That attitude has since changed, and she hopes it will similarly change for addicts — and their families.
“There’s this whole quiet group of people walking through the world with this agony of having a young one who is so unwell.”