Man helps save two lives with Naloxone kits
When Spring Gagne SASKATOON got a call Monday morning, he sprang into action.
His friend — a man he calls a brother — was in a Riversdale home with a second man who had overdosed on drugs. Gagne’s friend knew Gagne owned a Naloxone kit — which is equipped with medication that can temporarily block the effects of opioids such as fentanyl, morphine, heroin, methadone and oxycodone — and implored him to hurry.
Gagne, who is 20 years old, said he arrived at the house before 8 a.m. and pounded on the door, but there was no answer. He let himself in and found one man unconscious. His friend was drooling and appeared to have overdosed, too.
Gagne injected both men with Naloxone, then asked a woman in the home to call 911. He said he performed CPR on his friend until an ambulance arrived.
Paramedics worked on both men and they were breathing by the time they were taken into an ambulance, he said.
"They would have died if I hadn’t given them Naloxone, that’s for sure.”
In a news release, Saskatoon police said officers administered two more doses of Naloxone and first aid to the man who was unresponsive when they arrived, and that paramedics later administered a dose of Naloxone to the other man. Both men were in stable condition by Monday afternoon.
Gagne said he doesn’t use drugs, but has lots of friends who do. He said he got a Naloxone kit after seeing people die of drug overdoses, and is determined not to see it happen again. “Everyone should carry a Naloxone kit,” he said. “Who knows what your drugs are cut with?”
The number of opioid-related deaths in Canada has increased in recent years, according to data from the Public Health Agency of Canada.
A report published last month said there were 2,946 apparent opioid-related deaths in Canada in 2016 and at least 2,923 apparent opioid-related deaths in the first nine months of 2017. Fifty-five per cent of overdoses involved fentanyl or fentanyl analogs in 2016, compared to 72 per cent in the beginning of 2017.
The Saskatchewan NDP called on the government last month to make Naloxone more available in the province in the wake of a string of deadly overdoses.
In early March, Saskatoon police responded to three addresses over the course of a few hours where six people had overdosed on cocaine laced with fentanyl. Three of those people died. The following week, two people in Maidstone died of suspected drug overdoses.
Police services across the province have issued public safety warnings, advising people to exercise caution when using illicit drugs.