“The worst is yet to come”, WRPS Chief on opioid crisis

Growing concerns around opioid-use in Waterloo Region, as the amount of local overdose deaths doubled in 2017.

Regional Police Chief Bryan Larkin warns, “the worst is yet to come” – as he believes the crisis will only continue to ramp up in 2018.

“This crisis has tentacles right across Waterloo Region, and I don’t think we’ve seen the peak yet. There’s no real science to this – but when you look at the over 100 per cent jump from 2016 to 2017.. I think that’s very concerning. When you also look at the trend in Western Canada – they’ve been at it for much longer than we have, and they’re still seeing increases in peaks when it comes to overdoses and deaths.”

Last year, there were 580 locally reported overdoses – resulting in 71 deaths.

Larkin also shared concerns that these numbers will grow this year as drugs like ‘blotters’ and ‘stickers’ have now popped up in Canada.

“It’s another synthetic branding-marketing approach to attract people to use these types of illicit drugs – they’re often much stronger than fentanyl, and will contain carfentanil. These are marketed more towards people that are looking to experiment, not people dependent on opioids. So this is why we continue to push our message of education – know what you’re ingesting, know what you’re using, and use it wisely. Our message used to be ‘Say No to Drugs’ – but we recognized that that’s not necessarily a viable, or a valued approach.”

Xanax is another growing concern in Waterloo Region – as Larkin says the drug has already made an appearance on our city streets.

“We’ve seen evidence in our community where it is targeting younger people. It is a synthetic drug – so when an individual thinks they’re just ingesting Xanax, they’re not. They’re ingesting a cut product, a hybrid product, and it often contains fentanyl – and we all know that a small dose of that can be fatal.”

In December of last year, Regional Police launched a video awareness campaign called ‘The New F Word’ – which focuses on the dangers of opioids including fentanyl, and stresses the importance of educating kids, teens, and young adults about drug use.

The video has been viewed over 240,000 times on Facebook, and 40,000 times on Twitter.

Larkin can’t get into specifics, but says they are hoping to roll it out across Canada in the future – possibly even through a partnership with a major pharmaceutical company.

“It will become customized to the individual agencies that are using it. We’ve received a lot of positive feedback about the video, and we think it’s a quick hit that has a pretty impactful message. This is one of the key pieces – we need parents to have these hard dialogues with their kids and teens. We’re hoping if we can produce this through Ontario and move it out across Canada .. that it will have a very short, strong burst of impact.”

Larkin says school boards are already sharing ‘The New F Word’ video – and there are some discussions on making Naloxone kits available to them.

“The schools have embraced the video, and are sharing it across their school networks – and I think that’s a big positive. The video was produced on a relatively limited budget… but if one young person or user makes a wise decision to avoid drugs, then I think we’ve been successful. If you look at 2017’s deployment of Naloxone – there were over 200. Can you imagine if that life-saving antidote wasn’t available in our community, and we didn’t have the incredible paramedics that we do – we potentially would be looking at a lot more deaths than 71.”

When it comes to a solution to this national epidemic – Larkin says he truly believes it will need to be community-based, and community-focused.

“Not one agency will solve this issue, it is by far the most complex social issue that I’ve ever seen in my policing career. This goes across all spheres, it doesn’t discriminate. The more people we have raising awareness, and working towards this, we’ll have a much more coordinated and successful approach.”

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