CALGARY – A newly-formed team of Alberta health professionals is hoping to improve the availability of a life-saving antidote that can reverse fentanyl poisoning.
Alberta Health Services said they activated an Emergency Command Centre (ECC) on Oct. 20 in response to the need to “urgently increase accessibility of naloxone across the province.”
The antidote temporarily reverses the effect of opioids in the human body, allowing a brief window of time to save the person’s life with the aid of medical interventions. Dr. Nicholas Etches, the medical officer of health for the Calgary area, refers to naloxone as the EpiPen for opioids.
READ MORE: Fentanyl fact sheet: what it is and what it does
According to AHS, the new ECC team is exploring all avenues of increasing accessibility of naloxone across Alberta, including allowing it to be dispensed at universities and by family doctors.
The new team includes representatives from AHS Addiction and Mental Health, Emergency Services, Public Health, Aboriginal Health, Communicable Disease Control, PADIS, and Zone operations.
READ MORE: Fentanyl addiction behind a quarter of Calgary bank robberies, according to police
There 145 fentanyl-related deaths in the province in the first six months of 2015. An update on those statistics is expected at the end of the year.
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