By CKPG Today

City In Crisis

City in Crisis: Treatment

Nov 22, 2019 | 2:12 PM

PRINCE GEORGE–British Columbia is in the midst of an opioid crisis–the greatest crisis across the nation.

BC issued a state of emergency several years ago in relation to the opioid crisis, “If we call it a crisis year, over year, it’s going to lose its impact” said Deb Trumbley, Director of Patient Care Delivery “and the answer isn’t always to throw more resources at it we need to look upstream into what’s causing it–let’s deal with the social issues.”

There are four pillars to dealing with drug addiction, prevention, law enforcement, harm reduction, and treatment.

City Councillor Murray Krause emphasizes the need for treatment as a way to give those on the streets a shot at getting clean. ” People need the opportunity to get off of whatever they’re on if they’re ready,” said Krause. However according to Northern Health that may not always be the goal for people on the streets, “Abstinence isn’t the goal for everyone, sometimes food is, sometimes housing, sometimes getting my children back…sometimes all of those pieces are goals,” said Reanne Sanford, Regional Nursing Lead for Harm Reduction at Northern Health.

Mayor Lyn Hall believes that the end goal should be getting clean, “If you were to ask me what I would think would be the goal…I would say, well it would sure be nice if the person we see walk by us who is obviously either intoxicated or drug-addicted…to get them healthy…to refrain…to get to abstinence so that you can kick that habit.”

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Murray Krause says that the problems surrounding mental health and addictions began to climb after Riverview Hospital in Coquitlam closed in 2012. “When Riverview closed we were promised that there would be resources in our community, those never happened… when it was happening there were some of us in the community who were working in the community saying, we are not ready, stop the process,” said Krause.

Krause says many of the people on the streets may need care for the rest of their lives, while others simply need a helping hand to kick the addiction to finally get the chance to reintroduce themselves into society. There is a list of treatments offered through Northern Health such as day treatment and community outreach, opioid against therapy. Opioid against therapy is much like a methadone treatment for heroin addiction and is available at the Nechako Treatment Facility.

There are only four spaces for residential treatment set aside for Northern Health in facilities outside the region, which Krause doesn’t believe is enough.

“We need to invest more resources, ” said Krause, ” I know it looks like cash strapped, we don’t have any more money…but we can keep doing what we are doing and have the same thing happen over and over…we really do need to invest to have an impact.”