More than 100 people died in B.C. after an illicit drug overdose in June, the latest update to an escalating death toll that has medical health officers renewing their calls for a legal, clean drug supply.
Since the province declared a medical emergency in April 2016, B.C. Coroners Service figures show 2,895 people have died – an astonishing number that is only about 100 people short of the casualties in the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York.
“The public health crisis is ongoing, and it’s not getting better,” said Dr. Mark Lysyshyn, a medical health officer with Vancouver Coastal Health.
The array of public health interventions is saving lives, he said, from supervised drug injection sites to widespread use of naloxone kits to heroin prescriptions that are now being given out to hundreds of B.C. patients.
But the core issue that has been causing the crisis hasn’t changed, he said: the contamination of opioids with toxic and potent fentanyl, sold almost without consequence by networks of underground dealers.
Lysyshyn was a co-author of a recent study found that of 907 samples expected to be heroin, 90 per cent tested positive for fentanyl.
“The cause isn’t a public health cause. This is a prohibitionist system that allows a black market to supply a dangerous product,” Lysyshyn said.
“All of these programs are working and they are saving lives. But there are people who aren’t taking these programs. It’s hard to get at these people.
“One of the best ways to do that would be to decriminalize drug use and possession. That would allow those people to come out of the shadows, declare their problems and get help.
“We think it’s the legalization and regulation of psychoactive substances that would change this crisis,” Lysyshyn said.
The B.C. Nurses union has also pushed for decriminalization, and last year the B.C. Centre for Disease Control also called for the change.
Coroner data shows 105 people died from illicit drug overdoses in June 2018, bringing the 2018 total so far to 742.
That’s on track to match 2017’s record total of 1,451.
On Friday, the B.C. Ambulance Service reported a record 130 calls for service for overdoses in a 24 hour period. It tied the previous record set in April 2017. Paramedics saved those people, but most at risk are those who use alone, overdose, and are found later.
“It’s heartbreaking. It’s been a tough two years,” said Dr. Christy Sutherland, who operates a clinic on Columbia Street that has 80 patients being prescribed injectable opioids to manage their addictions.
“No one should be dying. Every death is preventable. Really, that number of deaths should be zero,” she said.
“When I started my first patient they got better really quickly,” she told CTV News. “I thought, I’ve got to do this again. They got better so fast. They would stop using illicit drugs, and would reconnect with their family.”
Decriminalization of opiates would also help her patients from being jailed and being disconnected from medical and community support, she said.
The federal government has said it plans to legalize marijuana by October 2017, but has said it has no plans to legalize opiates.
Health Canada removed some barriers to accessing prescription heroin for the treatment of opioid use disorder, the agency said. In June, it provided provided $8.9 million to a variety of groups that focus on surveillance, education, and developing best practices for medication-assisted treatment.
