Local school boards may bring 'opioid antagonist' into schools to deal with possible overdoses Local school boards are considering following their neighbours and potentially bringing naloxone into local schools in the face of the opioid overdose crisis. On Tuesday, the Catholic District School Board of Eastern Ontario announced the overdose kits would be placed in all of its schools, located in the easternmost counties of Ontario and including the cities of Brockville and Cornwall. "We hope that these kits will never need to be used, but in the event that they are needed, the naloxone will help to buy time for someone experiencing an opioid overdose until first responders arrive," William Gartland, the board's director of education, said. [continues 1000 words]
Drug use among teens is nothing new. But street drugs are a bigger threat than ever, because they can be laced with deadly substances. The Spectator investigates what youth are using, and how to identify the dangers A GIRL is hanging out with friends after school. One of them has stolen a gram of marijuana from an older brother. They pass around a pipe. It is her first time getting high. She is 14. A 15- YEAR-OLD walks through the hall at school. He sees a classmate selling cannabis-edibles out of a backpack and a friend making a purchase. A GIRL is invited to meet up with friends behind her school. Someone lights a joint and passes it to her. She is in Grade 7. [continues 1911 words]
Introduced to the dangers of narcotics during public seminar held Tuesday night Parents need to be involved and informed to help lower the risk of accidental drug overdoses among young people. That was the message heard Tuesday night at a public seminar organized by Hastings Prince Edward Public Health at Bridge Street United Church. About 50 people attended the talk, which was intended as an introduction for parents to the dangers of opioids, also known as narcotics. They include such drugs as codeine, morphine, oxycodone and fentanyl. [continues 591 words]
Independent local researchers are raising money for the third phase of a groundbreaking study that uses the party drug ecstasy to treat patients with post-traumatic stress disorder. The study combines psychotherapy with the use of MDMA, which "enhances the effectiveness of the psychotherapy by helping patients to access and rework the unconscious painful emotions and memories in a safe environment," according to the researchers. MDMA has already shown promise as an adjunct to psychotherapy, according to the prestigious Lancet Psychiatry medical journal. A randomized controlled pilot study published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology found that 83 per cent of PTSD patients responded positively to psychotherapy combined with MDMA compared with just 25 per cent in the group that received psychotherapy alone. [continues 146 words]
Naloxone kits are flying off the shelves at local pharmacies and the Street Health Centre, as fentanyl continues its disastrous wave across eastern Ontario. Dr. Meredith Mackenzie, a physician at the centre, said on Wednesday that its clients are listening to their advice and reading news reports and are making an effort to curb their use, but it's not working. "People are much more aware of the drug contamination problem," Mackenzie said. "That means people are using more safely, they're using less, but they are still overdosing, even though they have a big tolerance. We're seeing people with high-opioid tolerance overdosing on smaller amounts of drugs." [continues 826 words]
Mark Baratta works with drug users on the front lines of Ontario's opioid epidemic. But as deaths mount, Baratta's story illustrates how far society has to go to end the crisis . . . if it so chooses Like most people who might be called heroes, Mark Baratta shies away from the label. A lean and purposeful man, Baratta has saved 17 people, each on separate occasions. He chalks it up, with a shrug of his shoulders, to keeping his head in the presence of death. [continues 3104 words]
Young brains more vulnerable to fentanyl and opioid addiction At 23, Cameron Shaver seemed to be on track for success with a landscaping business, a new car, and he was thinking about heading back to school to take culinary arts. The jack-of-all-trades from Winnipeg was an inspiration to his friends. He'd come a long way from his earlier teen years, when he had struggled with drug addiction. Back then, it was ecstasy. Cameron had been clean for years when, last September, his mother Sandi received the phone call that no mother should get. Cameron had died of a fentanyl overdose. [continues 1441 words]
Canada loves being way up there, even No. 1, in those surveys about the best places to visit or live. Not so cool? We're also No. 1 in alcohol-related vehicle deaths among wealthy countries, according to a study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reporting on 2015. If we can't get our game together on alcohol, what's going to happen when we add legalized marijuana to the mix? I pity the cops tasked with judging a cornucopia of drug-addled drivers, dabbling from both the illegal and legal sides of the aisle. [continues 773 words]
How drug units deal with fentanyl The death toll for fentanyl continues to rise in 2017, with nearly double the number of deaths being reported in the first six weeks of the year. According to Health Canada, from Jan. 1 to Feb, 11, 51 people died from overdosing on fentanyl. In 2016 during the same six weeks, 28 Albertans died as a result of a fentanyl overdose. The drug was first found in St. Albert in 2014 and since then the St. Albert RCMP's drug unit said that currently there is at least one pill found in around 80 per cent of their overall drug cases. [continues 938 words]
A tag hanging from a dead man's left toe says the cause of death was an overdose of fentanyl, "unknowingly taken with other drugs." The cadaver draped in a white sheet is displayed in transit ads funded by the Vancouver Police Foundation and represents 922 people who died in British Columbia from drug overdoses last year alone. A spiralling number of deaths, often involving the painkiller fentanyl, prompted the provincial government to declare a public health emergency on April 14, 2016, and to launch its own awareness campaign on TV, radio, Facebook, transit and at bars and restaurants. [continues 704 words]
Canada is preparing to legalize and regulate possession of marijuana - with a target date of July 1, 2018. It's a long overdue public policy with sound economic and health arguments to back it up, notably: More harm is caused by criminal prohibition and prosecution than the use of marijuana itself; Criminal laws prohibiting possession do not deter use; Decriminalization of possession does not lead to greater use; Decriminalization frees up resources for police and the courts to deal with more serious crimes; [continues 689 words]
Four others in serious condition after ecstasy use at two city dance clubs Five overdoses near Toronto nightclubs early Saturday, including one that killed a 24-year-old woman, triggered a health warning and calls for clubs and authorities to take new steps to save lives. Police say the overdoses involved the party drug MDMA, also known as ecstasy. Tests should reveal if the woman also ingested fentanyl, a toxic anesthetic sometimes mixed into other drugs, or another substance. The overdoses near Uniun Nightclub, near Adelaide and Portland Sts., and Rebel Nightclub at Polson Pier are part of an alarming trend, said Councillor Joe Cressy, who chairs the city's drugstrategy. [continues 318 words]
Force believes missing money placed in police bank account Halifax Regional Police have located 34 of 72 exhibits that were missing from their evidence storage, but the remaining 38 - including nearly $5,000 in cash - are still unaccounted for. Chief Jean-Michel Blais will present a report to the municipality's Board of Police Commissioners on Monday updating the force's progress on finding the missing items from the Drug Exhibit Audit released last year. That audit was conducted between June and November 2015 after an officer was accused of stealing from an evidence vault. Police originally found 90 per cent of the drug exhibits in one vault were unaccounted for, and 55 per cent of the evidence in the money vault wasn't where it was supposed to be. [continues 278 words]
Health, community and emergency service agencies from the Kingston area gathered Monday to plan for what many fear is a coming public-health crisis. With a sudden spike in opioid overdoses across the country, medical experts, paramedics, firefighters, police officers, community health groups and representatives from public health units from Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington, Grenville and Lanark and Prince Edward County met for a daylong set of table-top exercises and discussions about how best to cope with the opioid overdose crisis should it hit the Kingston area. [continues 391 words]
WATERLOO REGION - A group of parents sit around a small table. Their eyes are red from crying. Nearby are framed photos of the children they have lost to drug overdoses. Among them are Iain Goddard, Brittany Cobbing and Austin Padaric. Janice Walsh-Goddard didn't even know what fentanyl was when she heard it killed her son. Iain Goddard died last May while Janice was in England on vacation. She got the call on the last day of her weeklong trip. [continues 1488 words]
When asked if fentanyl is the now biggest reason to fear recreational drugs, Valemount RCMP Officer, Chris Gallant said, "To answer the question simply, yes." The Valemount Secondary School hosted a fentanyl forum to educate residents on what fentanyl is, what an overdose looks like and how to reverse the effects of an overdose. A similar presentation was given to students earlier in the day. Principal Dan Kenkel emceed the forum and the panel consisted of the B.C. Ambulance Service's (BCAS), Dakota Stone, B.C. Emergency Health Services' (BCEHS) Community Paramedic, Jasmin Gasser, Northern Health Mental Health and Addictions Counselor, Heather Whalen, Northern Health Community Health Nurse, Bernita Nesjan, and RCMP Officer, Chris Gallant. [continues 578 words]
Reporter's eerie experience in simulator suit I felt like Jimmy Hoffa with one leg encased in cement. I was lurching because of my super heavy left leg, which made it tough to walk and impossible to navigate in a straight line. My ears buzzed with random sounds. My double vision was blurry with flashing red, blue and green lights on the periphery. If I shut one eye I could kind of focus on what was straight ahead. But barely. When four tennis balls were lobbed my way, I was so uncoordinated and my reaction time so slow I couldn't catch one. My right arm chronically twitched and I could barely turn my neck or bend my elbows because of my restricted movement. [continues 412 words]
Here we are in the biggest fatal overdose epidemic in B.C. history and what's top of mind for the province's addiction treatment experts? The need to "destigmatize" addiction. In fact, let's not even call the taking of deadly illegal drugs an "addiction" or "drug abuse" any more, they tell us. We're supposed to call addicts "patients" with a "substance-use disorder." Excuse me if I don't buy the nicey-nicey language. And I doubt if most people who live in the real world and who have to pay millions of dollars in taxes for all these latest trendy approaches to drug addiction do, either. [continues 703 words]
All first responders in the Fernie area are now equipped to take on a potential opioid crisis. Fernie Fire and Rescue were the last group in the area to become trained in opioid overdose situations by BC Emergency Health Services. The main area of focus for training was on Naloxone, the antidote for opioid overdoses. Unable to give any numbers at this time, Elk Valley RCMP Corporal Bob Wright did state that, "We have responded to Fentanyl drug use in the Elk Valley. It has resulted in overdose-type situations." [continues 623 words]
Provincial health officer says powerful drug, found in recent treatment-facility tests, may be to blame for spike in deaths last year The appearance of the deadly opioid carfentanil may explain the dramatic spike in overdoses in British Columbia, despite efforts to slow the carnage, the provincial health officer says. Perry Kendall said as the number of overdose deaths climbed to record levels in November and December, officials suspected the synthetic drug normally used as a tranquilizer on large animals such as elephants was to blame. [continues 404 words]
