Halifax addiction expert calls for increased access to treatment

Addiction is a widespread problem in Canada that has resulted in an onslaught of overdose deaths in the past year.

Western Canada has been the hardest hit with the outbreak of fentanyl in illicit street drugs.

British Columbia is trying to get ahead of the health crisis through the use of supervised injection sites and North America’s first clinic to offer medical-grade heroin to clients.

Providence Health Care’s Crosstown Clinic in Vancouver offers the opioid in a regulated setting as a way to prevent people from dying on the streets because of illicit drugs.

In Halifax, harm-reduction experts are also stressing the benefits of these advanced forms of addiction treatment.

“First off, it builds a trusting relationship with the client so they can access other services. Get them into housing, get them hooked up with the Department of Community Services to get them pharmacare coverage to then get them into treatment,” said community outreach worker Natasha Touesnard, the lead Naloxone trainer at Direction 180, a community-based methadone clinic in Halifax.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "First off, it builds a trusting relationship with the client so they can access other services. Get them into housing, get them hooked up with the Department of Community Services to get them pharmacare coverage to then get them into treatment," said community outreach worker Natasha Touesnard, the lead Naloxone trainer at Direction 180, a community-based methadone clinic in Halifax.

Eight people died in Nova Scotia due to fentanyl toxicity in 2016.

The data from the Nova Scotia Medical Examiner’s Service suggests four of those deaths were due to illicit fentanyl.

Access to addiction treatment is an ongoing problem in the province, particularly when it comes to opioids. Currently, over 50 people are waiting to access methadone at Direction 180

Touesnard says the province has the right tools in place for treatment, but the programs haven’t had a chance to succeed due to lack of access.

She says long waiting lists greatly increase the risk of overdose.

“Their lives deteriorate fairly quickly without treatment. So generally when somebody comes to ask for help, it’s the prime time to intervene and get them onto treatment,” she said.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Their lives deteriorate fairly quickly without treatment. So generally when somebody comes to ask for help, it's the prime time to intervene and get them onto treatment," she said.

The province is investing half of $1.1-million in funding into increased access to Naloxone, a drug that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose long enough for emergency care to arrive.

But Touesnard says without increased funding to sustainable treatment, Naloxone is just a Band-Aid solution to a bigger problem.

“We need to fund the existing programs that are in place already — methadone and buprenorphine,” Touesnard said. “It’s a hard thing when somebody comes and asks for help and you have to turn them away.”