(Canadian Press)

By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

hard to pinpoint why

Province encouraged by falling opioid deaths, while Red Deer matches four-year high

Jun 3, 2022 | 4:21 PM

There is some encouraging and not so encouraging news in the battle against opioid-related fatalities in Alberta, with Red Deer not seeing the same positive trends as the province.

The number of people who died from an opioid-related overdose in March, across the province, dropped 31 per cent since peaking in December of 2021 when 175 deaths were recorded. There were also 175 in November. In March 2022, 120 people died from opioids, the lowest number since April 2021.

Jurisdictions across North America have been dealing with record-high rates of opioid-related fatalities since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and related public health restrictions, the province says.

Numbers surged elsewhere, they add, when the Omicron variant was burgeoning in December.

Mike Ellis, associate minister of mental health and addictions, says, “We hope to see fatality rates continue to decline as we recover from the pandemic and continue to implement strategies to address the addiction crisis.”

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Meantime, in Red Deer, there were seven reported opioid-related deaths in March 2022, up from three in December 2021, an increase of 133 per cent. For Red Deer, seven in one month is the highest reported through the Alberta Substance Use Surveillance System since there were seven in June 2021, and seven in November 2020.

The last time Red Deer had more in one month was November 2018 when there were 10, and March is tied for the third-highest monthly total since numbers began being tracked in January 2016. Red Deer also had six in both January and February, higher than all but two months last year.

Stacey Carmichael, executive director at Turning Point Society, says it’s hard to pinpoint why Red Deer’s numbers are not aligned.

“It could be as simple as a particularly strong or contaminated batch of drugs that hit Red Deer, but nowhere else. It could be the precarious nature of our community support services right now,” says Carmichael. “Definitely, it would have to do with an overarching cloud of stigma. People are still mostly dying in their homes alone, instead of accessing services like our Overdose Prevention Site.”

Q1 numbers for location of opioid deaths are not yet available, but Q4 figures showed 50 per cent of all deaths in Red Deer were within private residences. In Q4 2021, there were 11 deaths in the city.

In Q1 of last year, when there were 12 deaths in Red Deer, 92 per cent were in private homes.

Alberta’s government says it is focused on increasing access to a range of prevention, intervention, treatment and recovery services. The system involves a coordinated network of government and non-profit partners working to improve outcomes for Albertans.

Work is already underway to build a recovery-oriented system of care and increase access to services. Actions to date include:

• Establishing 8,000 new publicly funded addiction treatment spaces and eliminating daily user fees so residential treatment is free.
• Introducing recovery communities, also known as therapeutic communities, to Alberta to provide holistic treatment to individuals experiencing addiction. Communities have been announced in Gunn, Red Deer, Lethbridge and on the Blood Tribe First Nation.
• Implementing licensing and quality standards for supervised consumption services to help ensure clients are better connected to the health-care system, to improve the quality of services that are being offered to people with addiction, and to improve community safety.
• Supporting services to reduce harm, such as the development of the Digital Overdose Response System (DORS) app, the introduction of a nasal naloxone pilot, expansion of opioid agonist therapy and fully covering the cost of the injectable opioid treatment drug Sublocade.
• Ensuring opioid addiction treatment on demand is available through the Virtual Opioid Dependency Program. Albertans anywhere in the province can get same-day access to evidence-based opioid agonist therapy (OAT) medications with no wait-list and no fees.
• Continuing work with police services and fire services to improve Albertans’ connection to recovery supports, including the Virtual Opioid Dependency Program, and providing first responders with the support they need to help respond to Albertans experiencing addiction and mental health challenges. This includes the implementation of the digital mental health tool HealthIM.

The Opposition NDP also released a statement today, saying their heart goes out to the loves ones of those who’ve died preventable deaths.

“The UCP should not be celebrating today. Instead of ridiculing and shaming harm reduction experts and advocates, the UCP must start listening to and working with them to save lives,” says Lori Sigurdson, Mental Health and Addictions Critic.

“The UCP have continually ignored scientific evidence of the life saving impact of harm reduction measures and have made it harder for Albertans to access services.

(with file from CHAT News Today Medicine Hat)