It has been more than eight years since B.C. declared a public health emergency in response to the overdose crisis, and while there has been a nine per cent decrease in the number of deaths during the first seven months of 2024, around six people a day are losing their lives to unregulated drugs, according to a BC Coroners Report from Aug 30.
Surrey is the city with the second-highest number of toxic drug deaths in the province, just behind Vancouver. More than 130 people in Surrey have lost their lives in the first seven months of 2024, notes the report.
The BC Coroners report notes that there has only been one death at an overdose prevention site, which was in 2022.
In a one-on-one interview with Surrey Now-Leader staff, Premier David Eby said: "We've seen the numbers (of deaths) come down from 2021 to 2022 from 2022 to 2023, and that's a good trend line, but the numbers are still way too high."
The goal is to "keep people alive, to get them into treatment," he said.
"Which is why we've opened 600 new treatment beds across the province, and new models like at St Paul's that we're going to expand across B.C., where you go from the emergency room to detox into treatment without leaving the facility," he said. "Our goal is to use that pilot to inform the design of similar programs right across the province, including in Surrey."
The province also recently launched a provincewide helpline to connect individuals dealing with addictions to resources, he said.
The Opioid Treatment Access Line connects callers to regional doctors and nurses, who can prescribe life-saving opioid medications. The line will also connect callers to regional health-care teams for ongoing treatment and support within their community.
The confidential toll-free line at 1 (833) 804-8111 will only be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. seven days a week, and it is not clear when access will expand.
When asked what his thoughts on harm reduction are, he circled back to getting people into treatment.
"I think it's important to keep people alive and give them a chance to get into treatment. I think that's a vital part of the strategy, but it's not the whole strategy," he said.
Treatment is a 'complicated' issue
Anmol Swaich, a Surrey Union of Drug Users community organizer and master's student in SFU's Faculty of Health Sciences, said in a previous interview with the Now-Leader that harm reduction is about just that: reducing harm.
"Our treatment industry is really messed up, like a lot of our members are people who have gone through various different treatment programs," she said. "They're people who have tried treatment, and treatment in the way that it exists didn't work for them."
"I think treatment is a complicated thing, and what we need to do is have evidence-based treatment available as soon as people want it," Swaich said.
"Right now, we have one detox centre in all of Fraser Health, so there's wait lists for that. Then after that, there's wait lists for these treatment centres, which most of them aren't even following any sort of evidence-based guidelines. We don't report outcomes. We don't report what's happening at these; we don't know what outcomes are," Swaich said.
In an email to the Now-Leader, a spokesperson for Fraser Health stated that it has 24 adult and six youth beds for medical withdrawal management at Creekside Withdrawl Management Centre in Surrey.
Fraser Health also has Rapid Access to Addiction Care clinics throughout the region that provide "a low barrier and responsive access to addiction medicine assessments and treatment plans, maximize treatment support for clients, provide training and distribution of Take Home Naloxone, offer harm reduction services, and facilitate referrals to substance use services."
Politicizing harm reduction
For Swaich, that's not enough.
"What should be happening is that we should be ramping up non-medicalized or medicalized, safer supply," she said. "People should be having access to that. We should be trying to combat the rising death toll. We should be opening supervised consumption sites, but this politicization and this using of people who use drugs as scapegoats for their own political benefit by politicians on both sides."
Both the NDP and the Conservative Party of B.C. are doing this, she said.
The Conservative Party of B.C. has sent out multiple news releases in the past two months blasting the NDP for what they refer to as their dangerous, misguided policies.
In a release from Aug. 7, Elenore Sturko, MLA for Surrey South and Conservative Party of B.C. candidate for Surrey-Cloverdale, focused on the impact that crime is having in local communities.
“The NDP’s ineffective governance has not only failed to curb organized crime but has also exacerbated the public health crisis caused by drugs like fentanyl," Sturko said. "Families are being torn apart, and our streets are becoming more dangerous by the day. British Columbians deserve a government that will take a firm stand against these criminal elements."
The press release outlined a four-point "commitment to restoring law and order" that includes a commitment to "develop a robust public health strategy to address the root causes of drug addiction that prioritizes treatment and not free drugs."
Health authorities offer harm reduction supplies
Two recent efforts by B.C. health authorities to offer easier access to harm reduction supplies also came under political fire.
On Aug. 7, Fraser Health launched a website offering harm reduction supplies for free through home delivery.
The online portal allowed users to add supplies such as inhalation and injection tools such as syringes, sterile needles and glass tubes, naloxone kits and fentanyl screening strip kits to a virtual basket and checkout. Since then, however, the number of products available at that portal has been reduced.
"I had a concern about the website," Eby said in response to a reporter's question at a press conference on Aug. 22.
"The whole idea of harm reduction is that someone's in touch with the system that they're able to connect to health care, that they're able to connect to treatment, and you can't do that through a website or a vending machine," Eby said.
Island Health installed a "care and connection kiosk" outside three Vancouver Island hospitals last fall. The kiosks dispense discreetly packaged harm-reduction items including condoms, wound care supplies, naloxone kits, take-home drug testing strips, bubble pipes, syringes and safe disposal containers.
A viral video by a B.C. Conservative candidate criticizing the kiosk outside Nanaimo Regional General Hospital has led to the provincial review.
"So we asked Fraser Health and Nanaimo and others, we're doing a review across the province right now to have a look at what they're doing and make sure they're helping people make those connections with real people, and that they're emphasizing the treatment aspect rather than the distribution aspect of drug paraphernalia," Eby said.
John Rustad, leader of the Conservative Party of B.C., condemned the placement of the vending machine in an Aug. 27 news release.
“David Eby and the BC NDP have failed to protect our communities. Their policies are not just misguided; they are dangerous. Instead of enabling drug use, we should be focusing on real solutions that help people recover and keep our communities safe,” Rustad said.
Sukh Shergill from Surrey Overdose Response Community Action Team said removing these harm reduction supplies puts vulnerable people more at risk.
Shergill added that while harm reduction supplies can be obtained at places like pharmacies and hospitals, many people do not go there for various reasons.
The Fraser Health website was one way to ensure people are safe and get the necessary supplies to their homes. This is especially important as over 80 per cent of overdose deaths have taken place inside, Shergill said.
"If we can take the lead from the medical system instead of maybe the political rhetoric, and say, 'Hey, this is a disease,' can we treat it like that and get people support in a compassionate way," he said.
Another key to success is people with lived experience helping "others to connect with services they want and at the time they want it, but it's often complicated," he said. "Their services are gated — 'go here to get this' — and so you really need that, you know, somebody to help navigate, be along your side who's been there before."
-With files from Wolf Depner and Sobia Moman
