Pubdate: Tue, 26 Jan 2016
Source: Globe and Mail (Canada)
Copyright: 2016 The Globe and Mail Company
Contact:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/168
Author: Andrea Woo
Page: S1

PROVINCE SEES SPIKE IN FATAL OVERDOSES

Last year, 465 people in British Columbia died from illicit drug use,
a 27- per-cent increase from 2014 and a rate not seen since 1998

Sixty-two British Columbians died of illicit drug overdoses last
month - the largest number of such deaths in a single month in a
decade of record-keeping.

In all of 2015, 465 people in British Columbia died of illicit drug
overdoses, a 27- per-cent increase from 2014, according to new
numbers from the BC Coroners Service. That is 9.9 per 100,000
population - a rate that has not been seen since 1998. Fentanyl, the
powerful opioid implicated in rashes of overdose deaths in recent
years, was detected in about one-third of these deaths, up from 25
per cent in 2014, 15 per cent in 2013 and 5 per cent in 2012.

Health officials note that while the majority of illicit drug-
overdose deaths do not involve fentanyl, there is no doubt that the
synthetic opioid is becoming a growing factor in deaths. The street
variation of the drug, illegally imported from overseas in powder
form, is commonly cut into a range of street drugs and ingested
unknowingly. It can be 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine.

Dr. Perry Kendall, British Columbia's provincial health officer, said
the growing prevalence of fentanyl has resulted in a shift in who is
dying from illicit drug overdoses.

"A number of the deaths seem to be not in long-term drug users, but
people who might be more recreational or occasional users," Dr.
Kendall said. "The younger, more naive users are scared if something
starts going wrong. They're worried that they'll get into trouble, so
they won't call 911 in time, or at all."

Sergeant Randy Fincham, a spokesman for the Vancouver Police
Department, said the shift is also reflected in where illicit overdose
deaths are occurring.

"We're actually seeing more deaths outside of the Downtown Eastside,"
he said. "In the Downtown Eastside, there are support services like
Insite, where people can ingest and do it with health professionals
close by. In other areas, we're seeing people use in their own homes,
and they don't have the same support systems."

The coroners service noted that the number of deaths in the Fraser
region increased by 49.5 per cent in one year, climbing to 166 in 2015
from 111 in 2014.

"Although all the regions have gone up, the huge jump is in Fraser,"
said Barb McLintock, spokeswoman for the service. Surrey had 67
overdose deaths in 2015, up from 42 the previous year; Abbotsford had
24, up from seven; and Maple Ridge had 23, up from 14.

Marcus Lem, medical health officer for the Fraser Health Authority,
was unavailable for an interview on Monday.

In a statement, he also attributed the increase to the growing
prevalence of fentanyl and drug users ingesting it
unknowingly.

"We provide a wide range of harm-reduction services across our region
and have been working very closely with our municipal and community
partners to educate illicit drug users about the dangers of fentanyl
and provide support for recovery," Dr. Lem said.

The harm-reduction services include funding to provide community
organizations with clean needles and the development of a pilot
project between the Fraser Health Authority, the BC Centre for Disease
Control (BCCDC) and the Surrey RCMP that would see officers carry
naloxone, a drug that can reverse the effects of an opioid overdose
within minutes.

Health Canada is expected to make naloxone available without a
prescription by mid-March. A take-home naloxone program run by the
BCCDC has been credited with reversing at least 373 opioid overdoses
provincewide since it began in August, 2012.

Abbotsford had prohibited harm-reduction measures until city council
voted unanimously to repeal the bylaw in 2014.

Meanwhile, health and police officials are urging drug users to take
extra precautions.

"Preferably, don't use, but we understand that's not realistic for
everybody," Ms. McLintock said. "Don't use alone; if you're injecting,
inject very slowly to make sure you're not getting a bad reaction;
make sure that somebody you are with is with it enough to phone 911 if
somebody is getting into trouble."
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MAP posted-by: Matt