Mountie administers naloxone, first aid to save man’s life
A Vernon North Okanagan RCMP officer saved a man’s life Wednesday night after he administered naloxone to a person in medical distress from an apparent overdose.
The Mountie found the man while patrolling 24th Avenue in Vernon about 11:45 p.m.
The officer found the man lying on the sidewalk with another person standing nearby.
The man was unresponsive and the officer determined he had possibly overdosed. The officer administered one dose of policeissued naloxone and continued to provide first aid.
“Our officers are frequently exposed to drug overdoses and part of our detachment’s harm-reduction strategy in response to the opioid crisis is to equip and train our personnel in the use of naloxone,” said Supt. Shawna Baher, officer in charge of the Vernon North Okanagan RCMP.
Throughout Canada, RCMP officers have administered naloxone 990 times since they began carrying it in 2016.
BC Ambulance Service arrived and transported the now responsive man to hospital for medical attention.
For information on overdose prevention and response, look for the Overdose Prevention and Response page at interiorhealth.ca.
Richelle Leckey, Boys and Girls Clubs of the Okanagan community engagement co-ordinator, offers a sneak peek at what will be found inside the Pink Shirt Day Breakfast in a Box, presented by Telus. The boxes are available for purchase at boysandgirlsclubs.ca and are packed full of breakfast foods, pink items and other surprises. Each box also has an invitation to a short Pink Shirt Day virtual meetup on Wednesday. The Pink Shirt Day campaign recently received a $10,000 boost from an anonymous donor. The club hopes to raise $20,000 to support programs and safe spaces for children and youth. The Boys and Girls Club also has just received a $25,000 Ted Rogers Community Grant from Rogers Communications.
More than 600 British Columbians tested positive for COVID-19 between Wednesday and Thursday.
That was a notable increase from the daily average of about 450 new cases that had been reported in recent weeks.
Almost 500 of the new cases were in the Lower Mainland, provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said in a government release.
The “uptick in cases” underscored the importance of people continuing to abide by public health orders, Henry and Health Minister Adrian Dix said in a joint statement.
“We remind everyone about the importance of using all of our layers of protection: maintaining a safe distance from others, washing our hands regularly, staying home when we are ill, using a mask in all public spaces and having robust COVID-19 safety plans in all businesses,” they said.
Of the 617 new cases, 17 were in the region served by Interior Health.
There are currently 4,348 active cases of COVID-19 in B.C., with 224 people being treated in hospital and the rest recovering at home.
B.C. had 348 cases between Sunday and Monday, and the average has been under 500 daily infections in the last month.
Henry and Dix also reported four more deaths, for a total of 1,321 fatalities in the province since the start of the pandemic.
They say that so far, the province has administered 180,691 doses of vaccine, nearly 30,000 of which are second shots.
“We all know what we need to do. Until we have widespread vaccine availability, these small steps make a big difference in helping to keep all of us safe,” they say in the statement.