HALIBURTON, ON-Haliburton has seen a rise in opioid-related overdoses and deaths.
Back in 2018, the Kawartha Pine Ridge District Health Unit saw a surge of opioid usage and overdoses in the Haliburton region.
During a meeting on October 23rd, Haliburton council was presented the Haliburton, Kawartha Lakes, Northumberland Drug Strategy by Megan Deyman, the project coordinator and Cathy MacDonald from the health unit.
According to the Haliburton Echo, the report noted that there were 29 hospitalizations related to opioid use and 20 deaths between January and September.
The drug strategy was given funding by the Ontario Trillium Foundation back in 2016 and stopped at the end of 2019.
According to the Haliburton Echo, the report noted a provincial finding that there were 1,337 confirmed opioid-related deaths in Ontario between July of 2017 to June of 2018 and that fentanyl had contributed to nearly three-quarters of those deaths.
Three-quarters of those deaths were men and 74 per cent occurred on private property. More than half of the victims were between the ages of 25 and 44 years-old.
According to the Echo, Deyman suggested a series of recommendations that the council could enact to take steps against opioids. one of those suggestions was that lobbying upper levels of government, a measure that has already been done by some municipalities.
According to the Haliburton Echo, MacDonald said that they are working with the police and hospitals to collect more information so they know how to better combat the opioid threat.