Over the past year, Island Health has trained more than 600 staff members at nearly 60 sites on how to administer Naloxone, a life-saving opioid overdose anti-dote.
Tamara Barnett, a Street Outreach Nurse, says it’s not difficult to learn how to use the kit.
Barnett figures in the last year alone, she’s used the kit to save the lives of at least 40 people.
Barnett says it is critical to have Naloxone available to the front-line staff, but also to people who use drugs, and their friends and family members who are worried about them.
In the past 12 months, Island Health and its partners have distributed more than 2,000 Take Home Naloxone kits across the Island. Barnett notes that there now needs to be a conversation about how to help people with their addiction, and the supports for that need to be in place.
