In order to prevent a full-blown fentanyl crisis, the City of Laval is stepping up its efforts against the potent drug by equipping police officers with the opioid antidote naloxone.
“We are often the first emergency service to be on the scene, on the call,” said Pierre Brochet, the director of Laval police. “We are often there before Urgences-santé for example.”
The plan was announced Monday in response to a rise of the number of deaths across Canada related to the powerful painkiller.
While the opioid crisis has been unfolding at a rapid rate in western Canada, the Quebec government has also taken steps over the past year to fight a growing number of overdoses in the province.
READ MORE: Quebec pharmacists to carry fentanyl antidote naloxone
In Laval, the move comes in the wake of five deaths and seven raids related to fentanyl since 2017.
As a result, Laval police teamed up with Urgences-santé in order to provide police officers with access to 60 doses of naloxone and train them on how to administer it in case of an overdose.
While supervisors will always carry the antidote on them, the other naloxone doses were distributed across the city’s police force. They were also given to investigative units and the six local police stations.
“Police officers out in the field will be in the position to act quickly,” said Brochet in a statement.
Laval police officers were also given 100 kits containing gloves, glasses, jackets and other protective equipment to prevent contamination.
While Laval police are now equipped with naloxone, police forces in Quebec are not required to carry the antidote under the province’s plan. In Montreal, police do not carry naloxone.
Quebec in the fight against opioids
With a larger fentanyl crisis looming and in response to calls from frontline workers, the province adopted several measures over the past year to make naloxone more accessible.
Last November, the government made the antidote available free of charge in pharmacies across the province to be re-evaluated every three years.
READ MORE: Chronic pain patients who take opioids are stigmatized: study
As part of the plan, the province announced a registry to keep track of how much naloxone is being distributed.
In order to help those who don’t go to the pharmacy, the Quebec government also announced in April that it would allow community organizations to have access to injectable or nasal spray doses of naloxone.
— with files from Global’s Gloria Henriquez