Pubdate: Thu, 11 Aug 2016
Source: Record, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2016 Lower Mainland Publishing Group Inc.
Contact:  http://www.royalcityrecord.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1654

TIME FOR ACTION ON HARM REDUCTION

Our hearts go out to the mother of 16-year-old Gwynevere Staddon, 
found dead of a suspected overdose in a Port Moody Starbucks on Sunday.

The coroner has not confirmed fentanyl as the cause, since the tests 
take a while, but Gwyn's mom, Veronica, strongly suspects that's what 
took her daughter's life.

Gwyn was struggling with addiction, and her mother says the wait-list 
for rehab was too long, while private treatment was just too 
expensive. (We're talking tens of thousands of dollars.)

There's nothing comparable to the loss of a child, and we know there 
will be more grieving parents to come.

The percentage of fentanyl related drug deaths has been rising 
steadily over the past few years, from five per cent in 2012 to 60 in 
2016, and the year's not even close to being over.

The most recent numbers for New Westminster showed seven people died 
from fentanyl this year and last. That may not seem like many, but 
let us remind you that just last month, police arrested two New 
Westminster residents who are now facing drug charges for allegedly 
trafficking fentanyl.

Fentanyl is 80 to 100 times stronger than morphine, and it's cut with 
regular street drugs - heroin, cocaine, fake OxyContin, for instance. 
Unless you have access to a lab, there's no way to know what you're 
taking, and what you are taking could kill you.

So how do we stop more people from dying?

Public awareness campaigns aimed at naive drug users, dabbling on 
weekends, appear to be working, and there are fewer deaths in this 
demographic. It's the hardcore users that are still dying, and on an 
average of about one a day in B.C., according to the coroner's office.

We already know the "don't do drugs" mantra won't cut it.

This brings us back to the old conversation around harm reduction. 
The principle is this: People will use anyway, so we need to make it 
safer and less stigmatizing. We need to treat addiction like the 
medical problem it is, not a deviant lifestyle.

Preaching abstinence to people who are going to use anyway does not 
and will never work. We need more needle exchanges, more treatment 
centres, more detox beds, more options for 16-year-old girls who 
would consider getting high in a Starbucks bathroom.

We know the political will is there. But we need policy makers and 
politicians to hurry up.

Every day, we lose another daughter or son to this crisis.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom