11 Fatal Overdoses Prompts Drug-Death Warning
Prince George, B.C. – The B.C. Coroners Service has issued an urgent warning to users of illicit drugs after 11 people died of illicit drug overdoses Thursday, including one in northern B.C.
The coroner says at six persons died after using drugs in the Downtown Eastside in a span of just eight hours. Another two fatalities in the same time frame in the same area are suspected of being drug-related.
Another five-people died yesterday after drug use throughout the rest of the province – one elsewhere in Vancouver, one in Burnaby, two in the Fraser Region and one in northern B.C.
250News is awaiting word on where in northern B.C. the fatality occurred though spokesperson Barb McKlintock says it was not in Prince George.
“We are not sure what has caused this very distressing spike in fatalities,” said chief coroner Lisa LaPointe. “It will take detailed toxicology testing and further investigation to try to determine that.”
In the meantime, she says it’s more important than every that users of illicit drugs do so at a site where naloxone and medical help are readily available.
In Prince George, Northern Health has extended the hours of the Needle Exchange (1114 Third Avenue) and is open seven days a week in response to the crisis.
Comments
This is not distressing this is evolution
When will they at least have the guts to say what drug was fentanyl related? Was it heroin, crack or .. the ‘pot scare’ they are running with now. Whats the matter? Tell us the drug of choice that was laced.
I for one, am so glad to see the B.C. Coroners Service issue an urgent warning to users of illicit drugs!
After all, we all know how much the users of illicit drugs are paying attention to the many other warnings from family, from friends, from the Police, from Government, from Health Authorities and practitioners, from newspapers, from television, from radio, from, from, from, from, from!
The first couple of days after last months Mardi Gras there were five or six hundred ODs in Vancouver’s DES. It got so bad that the fire department rescue crews and ambulances did not return to base after a call but just drove around the area for their full shift. In and out of back alleys and SROs in rapid succession.
I think they hand out the wefare checks next week so people can prepare for Christmas and it appears there is a strong batch of fentanyl floating around right now so the firemen and paramedics had better get lots of rest this weekend.
Solution is so simple, don’t do drugs, problem solved.
We aren’t allowed to say that, common sense doesn’t apply here.
Our justice system knows who the dealers are. Arrest all them.
“Our justice system knows who the dealers are. Arrest all them.” I’m surprised a few grieving family members haven’t looked after them.
maybe they have?
It is like the modern day version of small pox, or black plague. It does not discriminate against social classes. You can be an addict living in the VLA, or rich guy living on St. Denis heights. The tainted drug will get you, sooner or later. Keep spinning that revolver and sooner or later it will get you.
St denis heights? Isn’t Malaspina and Sadler drive the Beverly Hills of PG?
Many of them may have froze to death when you have to sleep out in the cold.
Just as long as the homeowners in PG don’t get dinged and taxes increased due to moronic actions! Like someone said awhile back, it ends out the numbskulls that just don’t seem to get it and continue to use it. Like olldcoot said, where are all the grieving families and why aren’t they putting pressure on the MPs or the RCMP to put the hammer down on the pill making machines and drug dealers? Although the justice system does have rubber teeth, and I for one do not have too much faith in them.
With the sleazy way the drug manufacturers operate (and I’m honestly not a conspiracy theorist)I truly believe the makers of naloxone probably have something to do with all these overdoses.
Think about it. What better way to get your drug to market than to help create a demand for it.
In the meantime it also thins out a huge social issue that puts a huge strain on taxpayers.
It`s a bad thought and I`d hate to think it could be true, but I`m more inclined to think about this as a cause than just drug dealers making bad batches of drugs.
There’s big relationships between drug manufacture lobbyists and government so anything is possible.
Think about it.
Apparently most of the fentanyl is smuggled in from China, so unless the antidote also comes from China the above theory does not work.
They have the antidote in the Phillipines. It’s called Rodrigo Duterte.
Any right thinking person would call these tragic deaths manslaughter at a minimum. The coroner has sometimes unlimited powers and in this case should order the police to hunt down and apprehend the the traffickers under a warrant. A once a week charter flight to Manila would get rid of some problems…
This is truly a tragic situation.But I suspect the dealers of this poison will soon figure out a solution to a major problem. Selling something to your customers that kills them is not good business plan.They will solve the problem, while our government spends millions studying a course of action.
Comments for this article are closed.