Pubdate: Sat, 10 Sep 2016
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
Copyright: 2016 Postmedia Network Inc.
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477
Author: Camille Bains
Page: A17

VPD TO PROVIDE OPIOID ANTIDOTE

Officers coming into contact with potentially dangerous drugs at
work

Vancouver police officers and support staff will soon have access to
the nasal-spray form of naloxone to protect themselves against
accidental exposure to toxic opioids such as fentanyl.

Chief Adam Palmer said employees are increasingly coming into contact
with potentially dangerous drugs at work.

He said it's essential to provide them with medication used to block
or reverse the effects of opioids, which have caused hundreds of
overdose deaths in Vancouver and across the country.

Exposure to the drugs can also cause extreme drowsiness, slowed
breathing or loss of consciousness.

Sgt. Brian Montague said there are reports of police officers in the
United States experiencing overdose symptoms during drug
investigations, including two officers with the New York Police
Department. "They began to get dizzy, it affected their breathing,
they began to pass out and both of them said they thought they were
going to die," he said Friday.

Three officers in British Columbia also recently experienced overdose
symptoms after handling drugs or exhibits contaminated with fentanyl,
Montague said, adding the cities involved have not been disclosed.

"Front-line staff and support staff in our property office, in our
gang section, in our drug section, are coming into contact with
fentanyl and very strong opioids on a regular basis," he said.

"We actually have a piece of equipment that was brought in from a drug
lab a while back and it's badly contaminated with fentanyl. It's just
sitting in a corner of the property office and they don't know what to
do with it."

Montague said the Vancouver Police Department wrote to federal Health
Minister Jane Philpott in March to request that naloxone, known by the
brand name Narcan, be approved in a nasal form, the same as in the
U.S. The approval came in July. Montague said all staff will be
trained to use the nasal form of naloxone in the next few weeks, but
officers can choose whether they want to carry it. They will not be
required to use it on anyone experiencing an opioid overdose in
keeping with a policy the Vancouver Police Department adopted in 2003
to not attend overdose calls.

"The only time we would go to an overdose is if we were requested
specifically by ambulance because of a violent situation or the
overdose had already resulted in a death and we were investigating the
death."

While paramedics have been supplied with injectable naloxone for use
on someone who is overdosing, the VPD has been opposed to officers
doing the same because they would be investigated by the Independent
Investigations Office if the person died.

"It becomes an in-custody death," Montague said, adding the policy
"defies logic" because paramedics or firefighters working alongside
officers trying to save someone's life would not be subjected to an
investigation but instead serve as witnesses.

Deputy Chief Mike Serr of the Abbotsford Police Department said he is
not aware of police elsewhere in Canada providing staff with
nasal-spray naloxone for safety reasons. However, Serr, who is
chairman of the drug abuse committee for the Canadian Association of
Chiefs of Police, said his department will also start issuing the
nasal-spray form of naloxone to its front-line officers because
opioids have become so prevalent, even for school-liaison officers.

"It's evolving so fast across Canada right now that I think everyone's
just coming to grips with it," he said of the escalating
opioid-overdose issue.

The B.C. Coroners Service has said there were 433 opioid-related
deaths between Jan. 1 and July 31, a nearly 75 per cent increase
compared with the same period in 2015. The number of deaths between
Jan. 1 and June 30 where fentanyl was detected has leaped to 238, a
250 per cent increase over the same period last year.
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MAP posted-by: Matt