Tara Jeffrey
When Sarnia Police officers begin a shift the odds are good they will deal with a drug overdose, according to disturbing new statistics.
Last year, police responded to 193 drug overdose calls, a rate of roughly one every two days.
And that doesn’t begin to tell the full story, said Chief Norm Hansen. Many calls involving an overdose get classified in police stats as ‘ambulance assist’ or ‘police assist,’ so the true number is even higher, he said.
“It obviously adds to the load on the officers’ minds when they go out on the road,” Hansen said.
“Police officers have to deal with all kinds of trauma but the opioid overdoses are particularly sad, because they’re preventable.”
In 2021, city police administered Narcan (naloxone) — a drug that temporarily reverses an opioid overdose —115 times, sometimes several doses, according to the recent Vice Unit report.
Ten people died. Their average age was 39.
The average overdose age was 34.
Fentanyl or a derivative was involved in more than 95% of the overdose cases. Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid at least 50 times stronger than heroin.
Other overdose drugs included methamphetamine, crack cocaine, cannabis shatter or edibles, and hydromorphone.
“Once a person is to the point of overdosing, on, say fentanyl — because that’s the most dangerous and most common one we see — they’ve been using for a while, usually,” said Hansen. “We just see the end results of it. We don’t see what led the person to become addicted.
“And I think that’s what we have to worry about — what’s leading people to this?”
Officials in Sarnia have long called for more addiction services, including a residential withdrawal management facility. Last week Ontario announced $12 million to open a 24-bed ‘Community Addictions Hub’ at Bluewater Health, meant to address “early-stage recovery.”
Lambton Public Health distributes free naloxone overdose prevention kits to anyone at risk of opioid overdose, as well as family, friends and others in a position to help.