Juno News - FUREY： Coming together to tackle the opioid crisis

00:00:00.000 The other day I had a conversation with a doctor in Toronto who works with homeless people on the

00:00:04.960 street who are dealing with addictions issues and there's one part of our conversation which

00:00:09.200 I don't think I'm going to forget for a long time. He was talking about how when he engages with some

00:00:14.820 of these people in the street and starts to talk with them, well they want to talk and they want

00:00:19.920 to have a meaningful human connection. They want to tell their story and they want to talk about

00:00:23.940 the problems they're facing in life and this doctor said that that connection, that moment,

00:00:28.400 is the opportunity to then refer them to services to say, okay we got your back, we care about you,

00:00:34.780 let's help you get treatment, let's help you clean up your life. But he was concerned that there weren't

00:00:39.920 enough treatment services available in Toronto. He wanted to be able to get more of them so there

00:00:44.580 could be more people who could give them that counseling experience and help them get on the

00:00:48.460 pathway for treatment. And as he was telling this story to me and as I was reflecting on it afterwards,

00:00:53.360 it really got me thinking how inspirational it is that we have two governments in Canada,

00:00:58.780 provincial governments, that are of different politics and yet they're both seemingly going

00:01:03.500 very aggressively on the treatment issue. You've got the NDP government in BC and you've got the Alberta

00:01:10.140 Progressive Conservative government and they are both really focusing on treatment. Now in past years

00:01:16.340 there's been different issues that have been the focus of talking about the opioid crisis but right now

00:01:22.620 treatment seems to be the new piece that everyone's really pushing. I know it's been around, I know

00:01:27.340 there's been aspects of it but they're really getting heavily focused on treatment. David Eby,

00:01:32.240 the premier of BC, he's faced some controversy because he's been talking about expanding involuntary

00:01:38.240 treatment, basically indicating that people who are suffering from repeated overdoses and are showing

00:01:43.260 up at the hospital regularly after ODing, he's saying look we got to just get these people into

00:01:48.140 treatment no matter what because this is not good for them and that's a bit controversial and I guess

00:01:51.500 he's walking it back after some blowback but he's really seriously exploring going in that direction.

00:01:56.480 Danielle Smith in Alberta really signaling how much this matters to her. Her chief of staff is a

00:02:01.680 gentleman who's spoken very openly about his experiences with addiction, living on the streets

00:02:06.220 with addiction, getting himself cleaned back up and now he's the chief of staff to the premier of Alberta.

00:02:11.340 Really inspirational, powerful stuff and I just think it's been amazing to see that there's these issues that

00:02:16.820 look we can be partisan about anything and we can be divisive about anything and there are some divisive

00:02:21.460 aspects of dealing with the opioid crisis but ultimately you're seeing two different perspectives,

00:02:26.680 the conservative and the NDP perspective going full speed ahead here on treatment and I just hope we

00:02:31.920 can see other provinces and other cities move forward on all of this because like that physician told me

00:02:36.940 such a powerful anecdote, people want to talk and when you start talking with them they basically say

00:02:41.680 well I'm not happy with my situation in life. I want to move forward and it would be great if we can

00:02:46.780 say we're going to put the left and the right all behind us and we're just going to help them move forward.

Juno News - February 27, 2023