The director of Fredericton Homeless Shelters Inc. works to get people off the streets and into more stable living conditions. But in addition to a housing crisis, Warren Maddox said his organization is coming up against a major problem: crystal methamphetamine, also known as crystal meth.
He said it’s the drug of choice in Fredericton.
“We have people that we’re interacting with on the street that are in a terrible state, you know, paranoid, delusional, may not have slept for days,” he said.
And he’s seen some people use it to self-medicate, which can compound the issue.
“In terms of what it does for mental health, it’s like trying to fight a fire with gasoline,” he said.
The medical director of River Stone Recovery Centre, Dr. Sara Davidson, said not everyone knows how severe the drug crisis is in New Brunswick.
“We actually have the second-highest rate of intravenous drug use in New Brunswick outside of British Colombia,” she said.
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Drug use as a survival tool
Davidson said the pandemic stripped away a lot of social safety nets, and the affordability crisis worsened the problem. Crystal methamphetamines can reduce hunger and make people feel awake and alert. For some people on the street, it can be a way to avoid hypothermia.
“There’s not a lot of reason for people to not access it if it’s going to help keep them awake,” she said.
But methamphetamines can also cause paranoia, heart attacks and death.
Davidson said healing the crisis will require supports like affordable housing and trauma-informed mental health treatment.
New methamphetamine treatment study
The centre is also taking part in a three-year study combining interventions to treat methamphetamine addiction. About 80 people from the clinic will take part in the study, which is being conducted around the country.
Part of the study includes typical treatment pathways. But it will also be giving participants a financial incentive to stay involved and providing a high dose of a psycho-stimulant.
Dr. Didier Jutras-Aswad, the lead researcher of the ASCME study, said the stimulant is like what is used to treat attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD), but participants in this study will be given a much higher dose.
“Our assumption is that people who are exposed to so potent a stimulant such as methamphetamine will probably require a higher dose of stimulant,” he said.
He said there aren’t a lot of options for physicians to treat people with methamphetamine-use disorders.
“One step for that is make sure that as a society, and the population, is really aware of how important that problem is and how little we have at this point to offer people who live with this condition,” he said.
But there isn’t just one solution for people struggling with methamphetamine addiction.
“Some people say the opposite of addiction isn’t abstinence, it’s belonging, so we need to create places to belong,” Davidson said.
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