Nearly three weeks in, London's temporary overdose-prevention site - the first of its kind in the province - has gone from four drug users a day to 44, and front-line workers are beaming. The stripped-down supervised consumption facility opened Feb. 12, a quick, co-ordinated response to the growing number of opioid overdoses among London drug users. As of Tuesday, staff were seeing as many as 44 clients a day. "Clients are having trouble believing it. It's too good to be true," said Sonja Burke, needle exchange director at the Regional HIV/AIDS Connection. [continues 325 words]
The medical marijuana dispensary that opened in Camden County in September 2015 is the busiest of the five that have opened in New Jersey since the program began seven years ago, according to a Department of Health annual report. Compassionate Sciences Alternative Treatment Center, in an industrial park in tiny Bellmawr, served 2,762 patients and sold nearly 885 pounds of cannabis in 2016, the report said. The state had nearly 10,800 registered patients as of the end of last year. [continues 603 words]
As a national opioid crisis wages on, Toronto police have decided to equip their downtown frontline officers with the opioid antidote naloxone. "This is about life and death, and that's what we signed up to do," Chief Mark Saunders told the Toronto Police Services Board at their meeting Thursday. Chief Saunders was tasked last year with submitting a report to the board on how the service might go about deploying the antidote, which can be used to reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. [continues 571 words]
Re: Opioid vending machines won't help B.C.'s addicts. Jeremy Devine, Feb. 14 This piece, written by my classmate, Jeremy Devine, contains misinformation and stigma. I felt compelled to write a response because his views do not reflect mine or those of many of our fellow medical school classmates at the University of Toronto. The article suggests that British Columbia's harm reduction approach is some ill-conceived mistake that jeopardizes the lives of people who use drugs. In fact, Mr. Devine's ideological stance is not based on evidence, and if enacted, could endanger countless lives. [continues 208 words]
Harm reduction is more than a job for Karen Kittilsen Levine. Reducing the numbers of people dying from opioid addiction and blood-borne disease is something she's determined to do. "We began doing outreach in Pictou County on November 1 and have more than 40 clients, and we're beginning outreach in Amherst within a few days," said Kittilsen Levine, who is the harm reduction coordinator for the Northern Healthy Connections Society. The organization collects used needles and distributes clean ones. It also provides condoms and information on blood-borne diseases. [continues 226 words]
OTTAWA - Setting up tattoo parlours and needle-exchange programs in penitentiaries would help reduce the spread of hepatitis C, the federal prison service has told the Trudeau government. A Correctional Service memo obtained under the Access to Information Act advises Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale to round out existing and planned measures to fight hepatitis and HIV in prison. Prison tattooing and needle-exchange programs for drug users have generated intense controversy over the years, and the March 2017 memo says detailed research should be carried out before embarking on a syringe needle program, in particular, "to avoid unintended and negative consequences for inmates." [continues 459 words]
Rally in response to the opioid crisis hears tales of loss and 'burnt out' workers Kim Pare said his family did everything they could to help their bright and beautiful daughter, but in the end she couldn't fight the illness of addiction. It's been almost four years since Kaitlyn died, at 24, from a prescription opioid overdose and from her father's perspective nothing has really changed. "We are losing a generation of people who could be valuable members of our society. We have to help them,' Pare said, speaking to about 30 people at a rally at King and York Sts. Tuesday's event was part of a National Day of Action in response to the opioid and contaminated drug crisis. [continues 607 words]
Company is gearing up to include medicinal cannabis under extended health-care benefit plans, helping offset costs for users Sun Life Assurance Co. of Canada will become the first major insurance company to add medical marijuana to its group benefits plans for Canadian companies, a pivotal move in the insurance industry that will help ease the financial burden for medical marijuana users, and a sign of the growing acceptance of cannabis in the Canadian workplace. As of March 1, Sun Life will include medical cannabis as optional coverage under an extended health-care benefit plan. Sun Life, which administers group benefits plans for more than 22,000 Canadian companies, oversees health and dental coverage for more than five million Canadians - including dependents. [continues 841 words]
The AIDS Network is putting itself forward to run Hamilton's first supervised injectionsite at its downtown Effort Square location. The AIDS service organization is preparing proposals to the provincial and federal governments for a permanent site where people can inject illegal drugs under the watchful eye of trained staff without fear of arrest. Meanwhile, it is also proposing a smaller temporary overdose prevention site as a stopgap that would allow supervised injection until the permanent location was approved and operating. [continues 417 words]
Provincial plan aims to fill gap for communities waiting on permanent services for opioid crisis A temporary supervised drug use site will open its doors in London, Ont., Monday - the first of what is expected to be many under a new provincial emergency-response program that will fill the gap for communities waiting on permanent sites. Thousands of people are dying from overdoses every year across Canada. In Ontario alone, there were 336 opioid-related deaths between May and July last year, up 68 per cent from that same period the year before. Fentanyl, a drug so potent that mere grains of it can be lethal, was a factor in 67 per cent of those deaths - up from 41 per cent in 2016, and 19 per cent in 2015. [continues 648 words]
Ontario's first legal drugoverdose prevention site opens Monday in London. The site, temporary while the search continues for a permanent site, will be located at 186 King St. The site is part of the health unit's response to the opioid crisis sweeping Canada, whose toll ran to nearly 1,500 people in the first half of last year alone. The London site, embebbed within the Regional HIV/AIDS Connection program location, has been granted an exemption from Canada's criminal drug laws. [continues 91 words]
The Haldimand-Norfolk Health Unit has expanded its harm-reduction strategy related to intravenous drug users. With opioid addiction an increasing problem in the local area and elsewhere, the health unit has set up three 24-hour disposal sites where users can dispose of old needles. Needle disposal is a concern for health officials because intravenous drug abuse is highly correlated with blood-borne illnesses, such as HIV and hepatitis. Used needles that aren't properly disposed pose a hazard to young people who may pick them up or people passing by who are inadvertently stabbed. [continues 235 words]
On Wednesday, the Illinois Senate Executive Committee overwhelmingly passed SB336, a bill that would allow people with opioid prescriptions to apply for a medical marijuana card, with only Minority Leader Bill Brady, a Republican from Bloomington, voting no in a 16-1 decisive passing. If signed into law, SB336 would amend the medical marijuana program to allow those who are prescribed opioids to apply for medical marijuana instead, giving patients the ability to choose medical cannabis, which has consistently shown to be a safer alternative, over the highly addictive and often deadly opioids. [continues 565 words]
Opioid drug use findings raise concerns about effectiveness of substitution treatment A study of drug use in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside concluded with 100 per cent of participants who used illicit opioids testing positive for fentanyl, raising concerns that higher opioid tolerance from the powerful synthetic drug could threaten the effectiveness of substitution treatment. The five-month study, led by University of British Columbia psychiatry professor William Honer, involved 237 high-risk participants. Of those, about half used opioids, either prescribed (such as methadone and buprenorphine) or nonprescribed (such as illicit heroin). Severe mental-health issues also played a significant role: About half had psychosis and one-third had mood disorders, illnesses that increase the likelihood of using illicit drugs. [continues 459 words]
Committee to look at report next week Sudbury could become home to a safe injection site. The community services committee will hear next week about the prospect of undertaking a feasibility study for a site, which will cost $150,000 to $200,000. Council is being asked to endorse the report. "Through community consultations, under the mental health and compassionate city community priorities, the suggested action includes the study of and possible establishment of a supervised injection site," a staff report indicates. "In addition, the establishment of (a safe injection site) has been prioritized by the community drug strategy as part of the harm reduction pillar area of responsibility." [continues 439 words]
Group to ask about opioid crisis at town hall Edmontonians will line up at MacEwan University on Thursday in hopes of getting face time with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Moms Stop the Harm, a group of parents who have lost children to drug overdoses, plans to have 10 to 15 members at the town hall to challenge the PM on the opioid crisis. "It's very upsetting for us how silent he has been on this issue," said group member Petra Schulz. "There are thousands of Canadian families like ours that are mourning the loss of a loved one, and the prime minister has not even spoken on the issue in the house." [continues 310 words]
Dennis Peron, an activist who helped legalize medical marijuana in California, died Saturday afternoon in a San Francisco hospital. He was 71. Peron was a force behind a San Francisco ordinance allowing medical marijuana, a win that later helped propel the 1996 passage of Prop. 215, which legalized medical use for the entire state. A Vietnam War veteran, Peron spent some of the last years his life on a 20-acre farm in the rolling hills of Lake County, growing and giving away what he once sold: medical marijuana. [continues 434 words]
Health unit under fire for perceived lack of urgency in pursuing provincial funds Matt Cascadden, who lost seven friends last year to the raging opioid epidemic, is convinced a safe injection site in Windsor would save many lives. "It should be pushed, I think we need it big time, now," the 36-year-old Windsor man and former drug user said Thursday. Now living in a downtown residence, Cascadden contemplated the impact such a centre - part of an overdose prevention site currently being offered by the Ontario government - would have on the growing number of addicts who shoot up in parks, alleys and backyards. [continues 1009 words]
It was an idea born in the middle of a devastating epidemic with an ever-rising death rate. It drew the ire of state officials, threats to arrest those who operated it, and fears that it would encourage drug use and addiction. No, Philly did not just approve of 'Hamsterdam' It was a needle exchange to prevent reusing hypodermic needles, and the year was 1991. Twenty-seven years later, those involved in the struggle to open Prevention Point - still Philadelphia's only needle exchange - say the parallels are clear between that fight and the city's decision to encourage the opening of safe injection sites, where people in addiction can inject drugs under medical supervision and access treatment. [continues 853 words]
British Columbia's first provincial health officer is resigning after nearly 20 years on a job he calls "incredibly rewarding." Perry Kendall, who declared a public health emergency in 2016 over the province's overdose crisis, will be leaving his post at the end of the month, when the deputy health officer will fill the position. Dr. Kendall has described the opioid epidemic as B.C.'s most devastating health issue because of the high number of deaths from fentanyl, which is cut into street drugs. [continues 337 words]
